


meet me halfway

by tinymark (lumoon33)



Series: markhyuck week 2021 [4]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Coming of Age, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Growing Up Together, Light Angst, M/M, Mark Lee (NCT) is Whipped, Markhyuck week 2021, Personal Growth, Pining, Praise Kink, Self-Esteem Issues, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings, but in a soft way, day 6: time | devotion, unhealthy amounts of compliments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:33:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 41,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28479231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lumoon33/pseuds/tinymark
Summary: "I'm Donghyuck," another kid says, tanner skin than Jaemin's, softer cheeks, and slightly crooked teeth. "Your braces are kinda cool," he exclaims, his voice pitched baby-high, fearlessly loud, shameless.Mark goes wide-eyed, a little breathless at the offhand comment, at the randomness of it. He can't help it when he snaps his lips closed together, embarrassed under the attention coming from someone brave enough to beam with crooked teeth. That's what makes the boy's smile prettier, somehow, the lack of impulse to hide it, uneven teeth shining proudly under the bright lights of the practice room.Maybe that's how it all starts.(or: mark lee’s journey to self-love ft. lee donghyuck’s help)
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Series: markhyuck week 2021 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2076168
Comments: 120
Kudos: 721
Collections: Markhyuck Week 2021





	1. some days aren't easy

**Author's Note:**

> alright. this is a monster. it started as "omg theres so many fics where haechan has a praise kink but not so many of mark with a praise kink i need to fix that" and ended up as....... this...... and more than a praise kink fic now it's a canon coming of age story with some soft praise kink....... just a mark lee loving fest honestly (also shameless 7dream family agenda)
> 
> also, my fic "talkin' about love (talkin' bout you)" can be seen as a trailer for this story, this is basically what mh had to go through to get to that point, but you don't need to read that fic to understand this one!!!
> 
> i listened to dress by taylor swift on repeat while writing this so you can have an idea of what you're getting into.  
> basically... markhyuck's story from the moment they met up to jan 1st 2021.
> 
> i hope you guys like this!!!

At 14 years old, Mark is all soft baby-fat, untamed long hair, and pointy joints. He is worn-thin shirts, baggy pants that used to belong to his older brother, and a collection of the same cap in different colors, boring and lame and everything-but-pretty, but good enough to hide himself underneath.

The first time Mark ever steps into a practice room in SM Entertainment to find it already occupied, he is bitten nails, sweaty armpits, and pale skin covered in acne. He's all body-wrecking nerves, and tongue-twisting anxiety, and a blank mind that's still unable to process complicated sentences in Korean.

He has his own fingers interlocked, left hand squeezing the right one hard enough to hurt, twisting and twisting to keep himself grounded, to keep himself _there_ as strangers’ eyes run up and down over his body, curious and surprised and judging.

"Mark's been training here for a while," the teacher that lead him here announces to the room, speaking slow enough for Mark to catch every word, a hand firm on his shoulder. Mark prays under his breath, hoping he isn't sweating through his shirt. "He'll be joining you from now on. He doesn't speak Korean that well yet, so be patient with him, please."

Mark ducks his head at that, trying to sink himself between his own slim shoulders before everyone else in the room can see the embarrassment on his face, nose heating up under his round glasses. But he squares his back after a minute, and raises his head with as much pride he can muster because " _you have to make a good impression, Minhyung_ ," his mom had said on the phone earlier. _"Be polite. And smile, even if you don't like it"._

He tries, awkward and forced and probably ugly. He stretches his mouth into a crooked smile and keeps his lips pressed together over his aching gums. He stares at the boys in front of him, eyes on their chins because Mark's brave, but not brave enough to hold eye contact.

One of the kids walks closer, tanner skin than Mark’s, brown hair styled in a cute bowl-cut, chubby cheeks puffing out when he smiles with pretty, pretty teeth. "I'm Jaemin," he says, speaking slower than necessary. Mark thinks he's sweet, even if it makes him feel a bit dumb. "Nice to meet you," he keeps grinning wider, keeps moving closer, arms outstretched to reach Mark as if they've known each other for longer than half a minute.

The teacher takes his hand off of Mark's shoulder, leaving him there to stand alone and gobbly, struggling to stop himself from recoiling when Jaemin finally wraps an arm around his frame, beckoning him closer to the other boys. It's a little bit terrifying, the weight of Jaemin's arm around him, a bit too close for comfort. But he guides him carefully, and so, so sweet that Mark's smile spreads wider, chapped lips parting when the nervousness starts to melt into something comfortable.

"I'm Donghyuck," another kid says, tanner skin than Jaemin's, softer cheeks, and slightly crooked teeth. "Your braces are kinda cool," _Donghyuck_ exclaims, his voice pitched baby-high, fearlessly loud, _shameless._

Mark goes wide-eyed, a little breathless at the offhand comment, at the randomness of it. He can't help it when he snaps his lips closed together, embarrassed under the attention coming from someone brave enough to beam with crooked teeth. That's what makes the boy's smile prettier, somehow, the lack of impulse to hide it, uneven teeth shining proudly under the bright lights of the practice room.

Maybe that's how it all starts.

\---

Turns out that growing up with people constantly telling you how good you are at everything doesn't lead you to believe it. Mark is just going through life doing what he is supposed to do. He sings until his voice goes hoarse, and raps until his mouth goes dry, and dances until the soles of his feet ache because he's supposed to sound pretty, and pronounce nicely, and spin properly.

But, no matter how hard he keeps trying, Mark's voice has been giving up on him for months now, cracking at easy notes and fading away when he tries to push further, higher, _better_. It's normal—he's growing up, it's just natural—but he can't help the hot embarrassment that crawls up his neck. He always has to twist his ruined fingers together to stop himself from fidgeting under the pitying look on his teacher's face, under the snickering glances that the other boys send his way.

They don't mean bad, he knows that as well. Mark's voice just sounds kinda funny right now, he knows he’d be laughing at himself if he could reach past the deep ugly disappointment in his belly. But Korean words still bundle up meaningless in his ears, and the other guys don't have the patience to struggle with English on his behalf, so the off comments spit through twisted smiles feel a lot more threatening than they should, make Mark shrink and shrink and duck between his shoulders. " _You've been born to shine"_ his mom has told him many times, but at times like this, he wishes he was small enough for everyone to disregard.

The room goes eerily quiet every time it is Donghyuck singing, though. Growing up surrounded by people who are convinced you will make it big one day also means getting constantly reminded that there's always going to be someone better than you. That is why it doesn't come as a surprise when Donghyuck opens his mouth during vocal lessons and sounds far more lovely than Mark ever could, even in his baby voice, still a bit jarringly high, but so clean.

"That was beautiful," Mark blurts out once the song is over, so impressed that he can't even blink.

Donghyuck's head snaps towards him, eyes twinkling curiously as he stretches his arms in front of him, playing with his fingers the same way Mark does when he's nervous. He doesn't say anything, but he beams back at Mark unrestrained and painfully honest. He looks gentle like this, docile in an unexpected way. In the short time they've known each other, Mark's already gotten too many jabs against his pride to know that Donghyuck's everything but docile, but his cheeks puff out every time he smiles—all soft curves and deceiving cuteness—and Mark has always been weak for sweet things.

"Donghyuck is our best singer," Jeno says, a proud hand grabbing at Donghyuck's shoulder with a child-like roughness Mark can see himself reflected in.

Donghyuck bends under the touch, but he doesn't pull away, and his grin only widens. "That I am," he says, chest swollen and chin up as if he truly believes it, and Mark admires him a little bit more for that. "But I can’t rap as well as Mark."

He sounds mad when he says it, the skin between his eyebrows wrinkled up, and he purses his plush lips into an annoyed pout, his arms cross over his chest almost defensively as he glares at the floor of the practice room. Donghyuck didn’t even add in the ‘hyung’, but Mark is too caught off guard to even complain about it. He goes dry-mouthed at the comment, even if it’s supposed to be mean, his skin tingling pleasantly hot when the words sink in.

“But I-” Mark tries to reply, but he has to cut himself off to cough when his voice gives up on him once again. Donghyuck raises his gaze from the ground to stare at him with expectant eyes, the frown between his eyebrows gone as fast as it appeared. “I auditioned as a vocalist, though,” Mark completes as he ducks his head, his voice only half-there.

“So it’s natural talent?” Donghyuck yells with wide eyes. His voice resonates way too loudly in the quiet practice room, demanding all eyes on him, but Mark is starting to realize Donghyuck’s never been one to care about standing out too much, or too little. Mark only blinks back at him, his own eyebrows arching on his forehead as he struggles not to crumple under the eye contact. “That makes it even worse, _hyung_!” Donghyuck scoffs at him, rolling his eyes exasperatedly.

He spits out the last word like an insult, purposefully mean. But the hidden compliment sounds so, so pretty to Mark’s ears that he loses his voice once again, for reasons he doesn’t even understand.

\---

Sometimes, being good at something is a matter of survival. Mark is learning Korean fast because he has to, but that doesn’t make it any easier. He's fairly decent at it, but sometimes practice still gets difficult due to the language barrier. He knows he's a good dancer, but following the moves isn't easy when you can't catch the meaning of each instruction. He ends up tripping over easy steps more often than not, bumping into other trainees, earning exasperated glances and tired scoffs.

That's why Mark goes back to the dorms later than he should, carrying sore muscles and creaky joints, and he still stays up paging through his Korean notes until his eyes itch with the lack of sleep. He is good at Korean, but he's not fast enough.

He wishes he could be like Ten, who arrived in the country half-fluent in more tongues Mark could ever dream of dominating. Ten has been joining Mark's Korean lessons for a few months only, but he's already able to beat Mark at tongue-twisters. And all Mark can do is stare at him, open-mouthed and tongue-tied, as if Ten has stolen all the words Mark could've offered and made them his own.

(Ten beats Mark on the dance floor, too, moving far more elegant than the sharp lines of Mark's body could ever achieve. But that's a whole different conversation, a harder pill to swallow.)

So, past 3 in the morning, Mark keeps gazing at his notes, rolling the same words over his tongue again and again, chewing them between his teeth and hoping they will taste familiar eventually. That's how Donghyuck finds him: lying upside down on the couch, his legs thrown over the backrest as he recites the same tongue-twister for the millionth time.

"Goodnight," Donghyuck says in English. He likes to talk to Mark in English even if he only knows a few words and his accent is a bit funny. Though, by the permanent smirk on Donghyuck's face, Mark is pretty sure he does it more because he finds it hilarious than to help. Mark appreciates the effort nonetheless. "What are you doing?"

Mark stares at him, his neck bent over the edge of the couch, his eyebrows furrowed as he tries to focus on Donghyuck's frame, hard to distinguish between the darkness of the living room and all the blood rushing to Mark's head. "I'm studying," he replies in Korean, patting the couch next to him where his notes are scattered all over. "There's a lot of vocabulary I need to learn. Some things are kinda hard to pronounce," Mark admits.

It isn't something to be ashamed of, struggling with a language that isn't your own when the person you're talking to couldn't speak your mother tongue properly even if they wanted to. It still gets Mark flustered, admitting that he isn't as good at something as he should be. He's suddenly thankful for his position, so he can blame the heat of his cheeks to the blood rushing down to his head.

Donghyuck doesn't make fun of him, though. He laughs, of course he does, bright and too loud for the quiet of the night (he's always too loud, exists like a thunder, something to admire and beware of). But, for once, he doesn't mock Mark. He bends sideways instead, his hands balled in the fabric of his blue pajama pants as he defies gravity just so he can look at Mark's face straight.

"It's too late to study," Donghyuck talks through his laughter, a little breathless due to the uncomfortable position he's in, his messy dark hair falling over his eyes. "There's practice in four hours, Mark Lee."

" _Hyung_ ," Mark reprimands him automatically.

Donghyuck only laughs one more time, mouth wide open and squinted eyes. "You can't even speak Korean and you're trying to correct me?" he teases, his lips closing into that wicked smirk that Mark has already seen so many times, he's pretty sure he could draw it with his eyes closed. Even if drawing is something Mark has never been able to take over.

"Don't mess with me, Donghyuck," Mark frowns at him. He's talking gentler than he should, he's aware that half-assed reprimands and a soft tone aren't the way to get your youngsters to respect you, but Mark has never had to deal with honorifics before, he's never had to be an older figure to anyone before. It is a suit that doesn't fit him, the role model cloak, but he will try harder to twist his body until it matches the right shape.

"But you already got better at it," Donghyuck says with a groan as he stands up straight again. "You don't need more study time, what you need is sleep, _hyung._ You look like a corpse."

Donghyuck is being mean again, hissing words through sharp teeth as if they are meant to cut, but the meaning washes over Mark warm and tender. The hidden concern gets his heart racing in his temples, so deafening that Mark forgets both languages. He’s left gaping at nothing, because Donghyuck doesn’t stick around to wait for a reply.

\---

There are some words Mark doesn’t like, expressions like _natural talent_ and _born with it_ and _meant to shine_. They steal his breath and get his cheeks burning whenever someone throws them his way, and he gets mad at himself every single time, because they are never enough.

Mark is good at dancing, he’s been good at dancing since he was a little kid, his mom used to say he was already dancing in the crib. He’s been born to dance onstage, they say, in front of a camera, before the eyes of a crowd with the power to judge him, with the power to disregard the effort that goes behind every single body line if he ever makes a single mistake.

He’s always been good at dancing, but that has never been enough, and it means nothing if you don’t put in the work.

Watching Ten dance is captivating, breathtaking even. Mark’s eyes always get caught in the beautiful curve of his arms, in the gentle twists of his legs, in the way his feet slide across the floor as if he’s made of thin air.

Often, Mark gets trapped in the edge of Ten’s smile, too, always bright and flashy, widening impossibly big when Mark admits to him, “You’re so good, I wish I could dance like you.”

Ten ruffles his hair fondly, cheeks cherry-red with exhaustion and brown hair sticking to his damp forehead. “At the rate you’re going, you will,” he says in cracked words between tired breaths. And Mark flushes pink at the compliment, but he can’t bring himself to believe it.

No matter how hard Mark tries, no matter how much effort he puts into each move, it never looks quite as delicate, quite as lovely, quite as _good_. He’s a good dancer, he knows that well, but not as good as he could be. Not as good as he’d like to be.

That is why, when Ten throws a towel over his shoulders, bends down to pick up his sports bag from the floor, and starts towards the door, Mark stays behind.

Mark walks into the opposite direction, his eyes blinking at the digital clock on the laptop screen when he goes to play the same song once again, from the start. One in the morning isn’t that late anyway, he can still go for two more hours, at least.

“You’re gonna break the floor with all the dancing you’re doing,” Donghyuck tells him later, when Mark’s clothes are soaked through and have him shaking even in the heat of the overused room.

Donghyuck is slumped against the mirror of the practice room, his hair and clothes dirty with sweat but already dry after the long time he’s been waiting there. He stays around with Mark every single night, and even though all he does is complain, Mark appreciates the company, a witness of his hard work.

“I’m just gonna,” Mark starts, but cuts himself when the lack of breath swallows his words. He flops down on the floor in the middle of the room, his own weight a bit too much for his tired knees to keep him upright when he isn’t moving. “Just wanna do it, like, two more times. Can you hand me a water bottle, please?” he asks, muffled against the fabric of his damp shirt as he brings it up to his face to wipe off some of the sweat gathering on his eyelashes.

“You said that an hour ago, Mark,” Donghyuck rolls his eyes at him when Mark huffs at the lack of honorifics, but he still gets up from the floor to get Mark a water bottle from the minifridge. “It’s the same thing every night. I wanna go home, I’m starving.”

“No one is forcing you to stick around,” Mark reminds him. Donghyuck only stares at him with his eyebrows crooked upward as he comes to stand between Mark's legs, a cold water bottle clutched in his right hand. Mark reaches out to grab it, wraps his fingers around the wet plastic and sighs at the coldness of it against the burning skin of his sweaty palm. When he tugs at it, though, Donghyuck doesn’t let go. “What? It’s true. You could’ve left with Ten or the others.”

Donghyuck keeps staring him down, but now his eyebrows are furrowed, cute chubby cheeks puffed out the way he always does when he’s annoyed. “You truly don’t deserve my kindness,” he says with a click of his tongue. He lets go of the water bottle so suddenly that Mark almost falls on his back at the lack of resistance when he keeps tugging at it. Donghyuck sits down on the floor right in front of him, giggling softer than usual. “And you expect me to respect you when you don’t even appreciate my love? You’re such a bad hyung.”

“What love are you talking about, though?” Mark says as he uncaps the bottle. “You always complaining about everything I do? That love?”

When he chugs down most of the water in a few gulps, he’s hoping to drown the bitter knot in his throat that popped up at Donghyuck’s words. Because he _knows_ he isn’t a good hyung, and he doesn’t even know how to get better at it when he hasn’t been _born for it_.

“I don’t care about what you do,” Donghyuck bites back, tensing up like a wild animal ready to attack. It’s dizzying sometimes, how quickly Donghyuck can harden all of his soft curves. He wears steel under his skin, always ready to defend his pride. Mark wishes he could be like that, but he’s never been good at putting up a fight. “I just wanna go home, eat and sleep. It’s almost four in the morning.”

“You should’ve left with the others,” Mark reminds him one more time, closing the water bottle and setting it aside. “I’ll leave soon, anyway. I need to get this one move right. It doesn't- I don’t know why, but it just doesn’t look good. And I need to-”

He’s rambling, pushing at the floor with his hands to get up and get back to practice, but Donghyuck stops him before he can stand back on his feet. Donghyuck is leaning forward, his hands still cold from the water bottle as he places them on Mark’s knees, fingers digging lightly into the bruises there. He’s barely putting any pressure, but Mark still hisses at the pain, shooting through him sharper than he expected.

“You’re doing too much,” Donghyuck frowns at him. “You’re _hurt_ ,” he points, rubbing his thumbs over the ugly yellow smudges on Mark’s pale knees.

But that shouldn’t matter, Mark wants to tell him, all of them are always hurt. He’s seen Ten’s knees before, Mark’s seen the inside of his thighs and the points of his elbows, skin painted red and purple and brown. And still, Ten keeps going and smiling and _improving_.

Mark can’t even smile now, the corners of his mouth tugging downwards as his throat starts to ache, his jaw clenched hard to stop himself from crying in front of someone else. “I’m not doing enough,” he manages to say, a bit strained and broken towards the end.

“You’re stupid,” Donghyuck huffs at him again, frowning in anger. But his thumbs keep running circles over Mark’s sensitive skin, tender in a way Mark has never felt him before. “You’re already good enough, hyung.”

That’s when Mark’s eyes get wet. He screws them shut, hard enough to make himself go a bit lightheaded, but a couple of tears still slide down his cheeks. He isn’t even sure why he’s crying, the nasty feeling of never being good enough all tangled up with the warmth of someone else recognizing his hard work. What he does know is that he feels weak and cracked open and so, so small. Because Donghyuck is younger than him, but so fearless and proud and strong. Donghyuck is younger than him, but his knees are just as bruised as Mark's, and his face always stays dry.

Donghyuck doesn’t laugh at him, though. He dances his fingers up and down Mark thighs, waiting for him with a patience Mark didn’t know he was capable of. Once Mark gets his emotions under control enough to stand up, Donghyuck wraps his small, chubby fingers around Mark’s bony wrist and drags him home.

Mark refuses to talk about it, and Donghyuck doesn’t push him. But Mark still swallows down every bite of the undercooked ramyeon Donghyuck prepares for dinner.

It should be the other way around, Mark should be the one taking care of Donghyuck, he should know his way around the kitchen, he should know how to take care of others. He should know more, know _better_. But, for once, Mark is too tired to care. He’s tired enough to want to be taken care of. And Donghyuck meets him halfway.

\---

“Dammit Mark, you’ve lost to all of us,” Donghyuck giggles, his words muffled against Jaemin’s shoulder where he’s leaning onto. “Even to Jisung, man!” and Jisung, tucked into Donghyuck’s other side—a lot bigger than when Mark first met him, but still so tiny that he can barely see him now—joins the giggling.

“I already told you games aren't for me,” Mark clicks his tongue as he throws the PlayStation remote on the living room table. “You don’t have to act surprised.” He frowns at his own tone, probably harsher than it should be, but the headache curling around his temples and the other boys’ laughter are getting to him.

Mark has always been someone patient, but he’s never been fond of video games. He doesn’t think it’s that weird to hate the things you aren’t good at. Games are supposed to be fun, but somehow Mark always ends up feeling bored and annoyed, and a little bit like a failure. He still tries, though, even if it’s only for the other members.

The five of them have been bundled up together on a three-person couch the entire afternoon, Mark thinks he’s tried hard enough.

“Oh, I’m not surprised,” Donghyuck is leaning forward now, elbows resting over his thighs so he can look at Mark past Jaemin, sitting between the two of them. “I’m having a blast, you _suck_.”

“You’ve said that a million times already, thank you,” Mark snaps at him, speaking way louder than he’s ever dared to.

He winces at himself once again, twisting his fingers into the cushion he’s got on his lap hard enough to hurt, just to ground himself. He isn’t used to this heat inside of him, something ugly that keeps simmering in the bottom of his stomach, pushing bitter words up his chest until they rest under his tongue, all dry and tasting of ashes. It’s a kind of anger so new that he can’t control it. And, by the way Donghyuck looks at him—round eyes shining with surprise and something else—Mark is not the only one who doesn’t seem to be able to handle it.

“Maybe we should change games,” Jeno cuts in before Donghyuck can reply with something nasty. Because that’s all he ever does, he twists himself into nasty shapes, grows horns to scratch at Mark’s thin skin, and always spits right where it hurts worst. “Mark must be getting bored,” Jeno adds with a light chuckle.

Mark’s eyes slide off of Donghyuck and towards the opposite end of the couch, where Jeno is sitting down on the armrest. He stares at the still child-soft lines of Jeno’s face, his eyes almost completely shut in a kind smile, and reminds himself that Jeno would never say something mean enough to hurt him. But Mark is already lit up and about to blow up.

“I’ve been bored all day,” he gets up from the couch, pushing the cushion into Jaemin’s lap harshly. “I’m going to my room.”

Donghyuck stops him before he can even move, leaning over Jaemin’s legs so he can grab at Mark’s wrist. “Hey, Mark, wait up,” he asks in this ridiculously high-pitched voice he uses when he’s trying to sound cute. But it sounds far too fake for Mark’s ears, much less cuter than his unaltered voice. “We’re just joking, c’mon. We can play something else.”

“I don’t like games,” Mark frowns down at Donghyuck’s hand around his arm, tan skin contrasting prettily against his paleness. When he tugs to break free, Donghyuck’s grip only tightens, and Jaemin huffs when Donghyuck almost falls on top of him. “You can play perfectly fine without me.”

“But it’s not the same,” Donghyuck says, _pouts_ , blinking rapidly at Mark as if he knows the power he has over him. Mark is so ridiculously weak for sweet words and cute boys, but he’s so riled up that it only makes him angrier. This time, when he tugs at his arm again, Donghyuck can’t stop him from breaking free. “It’s not fun without you!” Donghyuck whines after him when Mark turns to leave.

“I’m not staying around just for you to laugh at me!” Mark _yells_ , fists balled at his sides as he stomps his way out of the living room.

The thing is, Mark’s pride is an easy thing to scratch. It takes up more space in his chest that he’d like to admit, and it’s always been something fragile, but Mark has never had to defend it before, because he was always the only one blowing punches at it.

Now, there’s this kid who refuses to call him ‘hyung’, who jokes in tongues Mark still doesn’t understand, and laughs open-mouthed in a way Mark wishes he could do. This kid who presses at all of Mark’s wrong buttons as if he wants to set him off on purpose, as if he knows him.

“C’mon, I’m playing,” Donghyuck insists. Mark doesn’t turn around to face him, but he can hear Donghyuck’s bare feet padding after him, naked skin slapping the cold floor with each step he takes. “Don’t be difficult, we’re having fun.”

“ _You_ are having fun!” Mark yells again once he reaches the door of his bedroom, nostrils flaring when he finally faces Donghyuck. “Because no one- No one keeps laughing at you.”

Donghyuck’s mouth falls open at that, staring at Mark with incredibly wide, round eyes. He ends up drawing his bottom lip between his teeth, the usually pink skin turning white under the pressure. The lack of a fight makes Mark feel even more embarrassed, as if he’s getting worked up over something so ridiculous that it doesn’t even send Donghyuck into defensive mode. Donghyuck, who barks at everything and can grow claws in the blink of an eye.

Mark can only hold eye contact for so long, so he ends up gazing down, eyes fixed on Donghyuck’s bare feet. He sighs, sinking his head between his shoulders as he turns around to walk into his room, hoping Donghyuck is kind enough to ignore Mark’s ears, warmed up in shame.

But Donghyuck whines, “No, wait,” once Mark gets the door of his bedroom open, his hand flying to Mark’s wrist once again. “C’mon, hyung. _Please_.”

Mark turns around one more time, but it's not the honorific that makes him give in. In the time he’s known Donghyuck, he’s never heard him beg for anything, not seriously, not in a way that counts. Mark has to grit his teeth together to stop his jaw from going slack.

“I’m not gonna stop being mad at you just because you’re pulling the ‘hyung’ card,” Mark mumbles, eyes on Donghyuck’s chin because it’s never easy to let other people read the shame on your face.

Donghyuck laughs light and _sweet_. “Wasn’t trying to make you stop,” he says, thumbing over the jutted out bone of Mark’s slim wrist. “You look cute when you’re angry, hyung.”

Mark’s jaw does go slack at those words. His eyes jump up to meet Donghyuck’s, his entire body flushing up at the way Donghyuck’s eyes are twinkling, sharp around the edges as he stretches his pink lips into a crooked smirk. Donghyuck always looks like this, a mix of gentle curves and sharp lines, a walking contradiction. And, lately, he always looks at Mark like this, as if he’s got him all figured out.

As much as he hates it, Mark has always been a sucker for sweet words and cute boys, heart thumping in his chest as if it’s trying to punch his ribs purple. So he scoffs, tugs his wrist out of Donghyuck’s grip, and hides himself in his room. Donghyuck giggles on the other side, light and sweet (and loud, always loud).

Less than an hour later, Donghyuck bursts into Mark's room just to drag him out of it. He never says sorry, but he sits Mark down on the now empty, dirty couch—candy wrappers scrunching up under Mark’s weight as he shuffles to get comfortable—and pushes a PlayStation controller into Mark’s hands.

Donghyuck isn’t that much better than him at Pro Evolution Soccer, but he runs his pads over Mark’s bitten fingers gently, guiding Mark’s hands over the buttons with a patience that doesn’t seem to suit him. They sit there together, pressed up from shoulder to knee until their stomachs start to grumble.

At the end of the day, Mark’s head is pounding from staring at the TV for too long. And he feels young, young, so young, but not in a bad way.

\---

Whenever Mark gets his braces tightened, it _hurts_ to laugh. He isn’t alone anymore, Jaemin and Jeno join him on his visits to the dentist. Jaemin’s braces are the kind they put behind your teeth, though, so his smile still looks clean and bright and so, so pretty, Mark thinks he shouldn’t be wearing braces at all.

Mark doesn’t believe he’s got an ugly mouth, but his teeth are slightly crooked, not as white, gums constantly aching. That's why he smiles with tight lips and laughs with a small mouth.

Sometimes, though, it is difficult to remind himself to keep his jaw clenched.

Donghyuck is constantly around him, fluttering light like a butterfly and laughing loud like a thunderstorm, demanding Mark’s eyes on him. His giggle is so contagious—high-pitched and funny and happy-sounding—that sometimes Mark catches himself open-mouthed, mid-cackle, joining him before he can stop himself.

There are other times where Donghyuck makes it his mission to drag laughter out of Mark. Like right now, half on top of Mark’s body in the middle of the kitchen floor, clever fingers digging where Mark’s ribs end, in the softest parts of him.

The kitchen tiles are hard and cold under Mark’s back as he throws his head back. His eyes are screwed shut, round glasses crooked over his nose, bared teeth and mouth wide open as he chokes into a new fit of laughter every time he tries to drag in a breath. He’s stamping the floor, wiggling nonstop in an attempt at escaping Donghyuck’s grip. He keeps pushing at Donghyuck’s body to try to get him off of him, hands kneading Donghyuck’s shoulders, his chest, his waist—whatever he can reach. But Mark is so weak with laugher, melting right under Donghyuck’s thumbs, that he can’t gather enough strength to break free.

“Your laughter sounds kinda funny,” Donghyuck says when he himself has been laughing so hard that he decides to give them both a break. He stays half on top of Mark, both of his legs straddling one of Mark’s thighs as he presses his small hands against Mark’s wavering chest to prevent him from running away. As if Mark has the strength to be anywhere else. “It makes me laugh,” Donghyuck tells him in a broken pant, cheeks flushed and wet, tears gathering in the corners of his eyes after having laughed for so long.

And Mark’s teeth are slightly crooked, his smile isn’t that pretty, and his gums hurt more often than not. But right there, lying on the kitchen floor, he decides that maybe it doesn’t matter that much if he can get Donghyuck to laugh out loud like this.

\---

At 16 years old, Mark is thinner legs, shorter hair, and a hard tummy. He still wears thin, oversized shirts and baggy pants, and he chooses a different cap out of his too-big collection every day. He's taller, longer, and everything hurts twice as much than when he was 14. But his skin is also twice as thick.

He has gotten used to overused practice rooms. Nostrils itching at the rank smell of cold sweat, head pounding at the loud voices of too many overexcited teenagers, feet aching after way too many hours going over the same routine—all of it is familiar to him now. Walls made of mirrors that gather more of his hours in their corners than his bedroom back at the dorms, damp clothes like a second skin, proud bruises that hurt like first-place awards.

But Mark still remembers the embarrassment of his first new day in a shared practice room, when he felt far too small in front of kids that were younger than him, shorter than him, rounder than him, and still managed to look threatening to his eyes. He keeps all his old fears under his skin, so he can't trip over them ever again.

This time, he's on the other side of the room, standing tall and proud and flanked by his members as two new kids look at them with wary eyes and trembling fingers. They look so young, their pointy shoulders slumped and their chubby faces ducked down as if they are trying to shrink into nothingness, like a mirror of Mark's past self.

And Mark has never been good with new people. His neck and the back of his knees start to sweat as he takes a step closer, his tongue going dry and heavy in his mouth as he forces a wide smile into his lips, all crooked teeth and ugly braces and paling in comparison to Jaemin's, but hopefully kind enough.

"Renjun and Chenle, right?" he asks, voice quiet and mouth tiny, but he still asks. The boys look up at him with big eyes and polite smiles, and Mark walks closer. "Nice to meet you," he tells them in the little clumsy Chinese he knows, and drapes his arms around their shoulders to beckon them closer to the others.

\---

During his years as a trainee, Mark learns to share practice rooms and a house and the shower. He learns to watch and digest and mimic. He learns to accept that his body may not have been made for delicate choreographies, and to embrace the power in the sharpness of his lines. Mark also learns that reciting can be just as pretty as singing, and a whole lot more fun. He learns to keep his head held high when others look him in the eye, even if he only lasts three counted seconds. He learns to stand up for himself, too, and to scream until his throat tastes like fire, and that crying in front of others doesn’t have to be shameful, even if he still hates it. Mark learns to take the lead and to speak first and to hold out his hand. He learns to play Pro Evolution Soccer just well enough to beat Donghyuck. He learns enough Korean to crack the meaning behind Donghyuck’s meanest jokes. He learns that he likes the way his laughter sounds tangled up with Donghyuck’s. He learns that sharp words are the only way Donghyuck knows how to show soft feelings, and he learns enough patience to read between most of Donghyuck’s lines.

\---

Mark isn’t sure if gentleness is something that can be learned. He’s never been soft-handed, round-edged, delicate-looking. He’s always been pointy edges and sharp lines and harsh moves. But that’s only on the outside.

Inside of him, Mark’s got a weak heart that craves validation as desperately as his lungs long for air. And he’s got so much love and life to share that, sometimes, he comes bursting at the seams, energy so fierce that it pours out of him in the form of punches and kicks and pinches when all he wants to do is cradle, caress and admire. But those are languages he hasn’t learned how to speak yet, so instead he gifts away compliments like candy, small and cheap, but so, so sweet, he wishes, he could gift his own words to his own ears.

“You’ve worked hard,” he says after their first stage as NCT Dream, the arm he’s got wrapped around Jeno’s shoulders squeezing harder than necessary. “I think we look really cool together.”

“Cooler with us in these hoverboards than with the hyungs?” Jaemin asks, an skeptical eyebrow raised at Mark as he wipes his sweaty face with a towel.

“Personally,” Donghyuck chimes in all of a sudden, sounding way too close as he slots himself between Mark and Jeno. He breaks their embrace to squeeze his body between them, smiling proudly with full cheeks and glistening skin when he hangs his arms around their shoulders. “I think I always look cool.”

Jaemin huffs at him, his eyes rolling with faked exasperation before he’s turning around to wipe Jisung’s face, standing small and jittery next to him. Jeno scoffs next, pushing his hand against Donghyuck’s chubby cheek before he’s breaking free of the embrace and walking away.

Mark only giggles, squirming a little under Donghyuck’s arm, way too warm and heavy over Mark’s tired and heated shoulders after a performance. But he still mumbles, “Yeah, that you do,” because he means it, and he’s never been good at keeping truths under his tongue.

Donghyuck looks at him with a frown on his sweaty forehead, eyes squinted in mistrust. Mark can only hold eye contact for so long, and it gets even harder when Donghyuck is only a breath away from him, so close that Mark can see the droplets of sweat hanging from his eyelashes. Mark’s eyes drop to the floor as another embarrassed, awkward giggle bursts out of him. But when he curls a hand around Donghyuck’s ear to tug at it hard, it burns under his fingers just as much as the skin of Mark’s own cheeks.

“Well, you always look lame,” Donghyuck tells him, pushing Mark away and rubbing at his ear with an offended face.

“Yeah,” Mark snickers, smiling so big that it feels like his face might rip in two. “That I do.”

There is no valid reason for Donghyuck to get mad when Mark is agreeing with him, not when he’s someone who would do anything to prove he’s right. He still punches Mark’s shoulder in annoyance and complains, “I’m the only one who can talk shit about you, asshole.”

Somehow, the words heat up Mark’s cheeks more than any compliment. So he punches Donghyuck right back.

\---

Mark has always been told to keep his head high, but not too high. He’s been raised to shine, but only with half dimmed light. That’s why he has never learned how to handle compliments. He only knows how to reject them, how to duck his head in shame, smile politely and mumble _no, I’m not_ or _you more_ , instead of _I know_ and _thank you_ and _you too_.

It’s the same reason why he runs out of words when an interviewer asks him, “What’s so special about you that you were able to debut in all the NCT units?”

“I’m not- I mean, it’s not that I’m special, I just-” he stumbles, eyes pointed to the floor as he breathes hard into the mic. There are many eyes on him, the kind of attention that rubs him raw instead of melting him inside. “I guess I just fit every concept? You know, I’m still kinda young, so I just fit with NCT Dream, right? It’s nothing special, really,” he rushes through his words, gripping the mic tightly so it can’t slide out of his damp palm. His eyes find Donghyuck’s almost accidentally, and he takes in the hard edge of the look on Donghyuck’s face, the annoyed wrinkle between his eyebrows, his plush lower lip jutted out in an almost childish pout. “You should ask Haechan, though,” Mark suggests, setting his shoulders and straightening his back when Donghyuck goes wide-eyed, cheeks turning pretty pink. “He debuted in two units! He’s been working so hard this year, he’s doing so well.”

Donghyuck collects himself in record time, the annoyance and surprise on his face completely washed away once he brings his own mic to his mouth.

“What can I say?” he speaks with steady words and a relaxed tone, glowing under the lights of the set as if he’s been made to be the main character. “I’ve been born for it,” he smiles a perfect smile that might have as well been painted on his face, but that doesn’t look any less real. He’s so shameless, effortlessly nonchalant and elegant, all at the same time. It’s always like this with him, he takes completely contrary images and makes them fit together somehow, like the walking riddle he is.

A riddle and an exception. Because Mark catches himself thinking that _yes_ , Donghyuck has been born for it, _meant to shine_. And he still hates those words, but Donghyuck exists in front of a camera as comfortably as he does between the walls of their dorms, loud as a thunder and bright as lightning, smiling just enough to leave everyone breathless.

“Mark hyung is too modest to say it,” Donghyuck keeps talking, looking at the interviewer with the same easiness he looks at his friends. “But he’s an all-rounder too.”

Taeyong giggles at that, patting Donghyuck’s back softly from where he is sitting behind him, but no one fights Donghyuck on his words. Mark would if he could. He kind of wants to stand up and gesture at Donghyuck’s body as he lists off all the obvious things Donghyuck is good at and Mark can only ever dream of mastering.

But he can’t, ‘cause Donghyuck’s got him melting with a single sentence, jittery and speechless and warm for all the right reasons.

\---

It starts with a dare.

“You fry one egg properly and I’ll clean your room for a week,” Johnny had said, staring at Mark with his chest puffed out and a familiar wicked glint in his eyes.

“Do you want him to set the kitchen on fire?” Donghyuck had joined him, a crooked smirk matching Johnny’s on his lips.

Mark had huffed, his sore pride winning the wrestling match against his embarrassment. “It’s one egg, how difficult can it be?”

And that’s how he ends up in the kitchen like this: oil splattered all over his baby-blue shirt, fingers stained with sticky yolk, and broken eggshells scattered all over the counter as he piles broken egg after broken egg in a sad plate.

He’s sure he would be laughing at himself if he were looking at the scene from the outside. He wishes he could step out of his own body and join Johnny and Donghyuck, leaning against the kitchen table as they dissolve into fits of giggles each time Mark tries to walk closer to the damn terrifying frypan. Instead, he’s standing in front of a hot kitchen with his ears in flames as he tucks his chin to the collar of his shirt.

It’s funny, Mark knows it is funny. But there is something incredibly humiliating about failing at something almost everyone is able to do when you’ve been raised to excel at everything. And there is something incredibly frustrating at the inability to talk past your shame and ask for help when you need it. So he keeps fucking up and burning his fingers until Donghyuck steps beside him, wrapping one of his hands firmly around Mark’s wrist to stop him from cracking and breaking yet another egg.

“You have to do it gently, like this,” Donghyuck scoffs into the side of Mark’s face, sounding incredibly exasperated. The slide of his fingers over Mark’s skin is tender, though. He drapes his hand all over Mark’s, holding onto him softly as he guides him patiently to crack the eggshell against the edge of the countertop. “You won’t get burned if you drop the egg closer to the pan,” Donghyuck moves behind Mark, his hard chest pressed to Mark’s back as he grabs both of his hands, working their fingers together to break the eggshell through the middle. “Like this,” he says right into Mark’s ear.

He’s so close, Mark gets so lost in the sound of Donghyuck’s voice that he doesn’t even jump startled once the oil starts to splutter. He isn’t even looking at the frypan, eyes trained on Donghyuck’s hands all over his own, on the tan skin draped over Mark’s pale fingers. Donghyuck’s hands are smaller than Mark’s, short, round fingers with cut-clean nails, unlike Mark’s rough knuckles, half-bitten nails, calloused pads from strumming his guitar for too long. Still, Donghyuck holds him firm and sure, as if he knows exactly where he wants to lead Mark, as if he knows for a fact Mark will allow him to lead him anywhere.

It’s that sensation again, something juvenile setting roots into Mark’s chest, making him feel so damn young and small.

“You should add some salt afterward,” Donghyuck says as he lets go of Mark’s hands, stepping away from him easily.

When Mark turns around to look at him, Donghyuck’s face is still pushed into an exasperated grimace, his foot tapping against the floor in impatience, completely oblivious to his ability to set a thunderstorm inside of Mark’s brain in the blink of an eye.

“ _Hyung_ ,” Mark reminds him.

But Donghyuck rolls his eyes at him, sticking his tongue into his right cheek to stop himself from laughing. “I know I’m the one teaching you here, but there’s no need to call me that, Mark.”

“It’s gonna get burned and ruined again if you don’t hurry up, Mark,” Johnny chimes in before Mark can find the words to reply, and Donghyuck breaks into a yet another giggle.

Mark shakes his head, whatever he was just feeling getting buried under a new wave of embarrassment as he busies himself with the cooking. He keeps frowning at himself as he gets the egg out of the frypan, dropping it into a clean plate as gently as he can to avoid ruining it at the last second. When he sets the plate on the kitchen table, he does so harshly, wincing at the jarring sound it makes against the white surface.

“You wanna break the plate now?” Johnny mocks him. “All those eggs weren’t enough for you?”

Usually, Mark prides himself on how often he can take a joke. After all, you can’t survive in a group like theirs if you don’t learn to juggle with complete opposite senses of humor (Mark learned it the hard way, and Donghyuck was the one to teach him, as always). But being bossed around and mocked makes him feel _dumb_. So he presses his lips together and frowns, glaring at the table as he crosses his arms over his chest defensively, trying to protect the little honor he’s got left.

“Shut up, you’re gonna make him mad,” Donghyuck says, and Mark wants to call him out on his hypocrisy so badly. But suddenly Donghyuck is pressed up against him from shoulder to thigh, leaning his weight on Mark’s body as if there isn’t plenty of space in the room to stand other than in Mark’s personal bubble. “You did well, though,” Donghyuck nudges him with his shoulder, gifting Mark a small smirk when he goes wide-eyed. “You’re a good student.”

Donghyuck makes him feel _dizzy_ , that’s the only word Mark can find. He’s always burning with embarrassment when Donghyuck is near him, dangling between the good kind and the bad kind, ears permanently on fire as he struggles to hold Donghyuck’s gaze.

“It was all you, though,” Mark admits with a wrinkled nose, eyes pointing to the almost perfect egg that’s sitting lonely on the plate.

“Well, yeah,” Donghyuck agrees as if it’s something obvious, always so shameless, smiling like he knows his worth. And that’s just one more point Mark has to add to the list of things he admires about Donghyuck. But it doesn’t stop him from pinching Donghyuck’s side and pushing him away when he says, “You have to clean my room for a week now.”

\---

Donghyuck is a prankster by nature. The years keep passing by and he gets better and better at joking around, quick-witted and sharp-tongued, smirking with danger in his eyes. Mark has learned to exist around him without getting electrocuted, but there is no way you can get used to a storm like him. Being Donghyuck’s friend means permanent red cheeks and sweaty palms, head ducked in embarrassment when he decides to turn you into the butt of his next joke.

And Mark ends up as the butt of the joke more often than not.

“Just admit you wrote _Baby Don’t Like It_ about me,” Donghyuck presses, lying sideways on Mark’s bed even though his isn’t even a meter away. “I’ve already told everyone, anyway.”

Writing songs has never been as personal to Mark as it is to Taeyong, he thinks he doesn’t have enough personal experiences that are worth the struggle of turning them into poetry. As of right now, writing songs is just one more task to Mark, one more thing in the endless list of stuff he should know how to handle, that’s why he never knows what to answer when someone asks him what his lyrics are about.

Mark likes to think of composing like a puzzle, clicking words together the way they sound best, molding their edges just enough for them to _fit_. But he’s mildly aware that it isn’t enough, that music runs deeper than clever word play and pretty words. He turns around on his chair, taps his fingers against the closed notebook he keeps on his desk and thinks that, some day, he will get there. Some day, Taeyong will start a conversation about baring yourself between lines, and Mark will be able to meet him halfway.

Today is not that day, though.

“I’ve told you a million times it is not about you, Hyuck,” Mark frowns down at his notebook, fingertips curled around the edge, his nails sliding in between the pages. “And if it was, I would never tell you.”

Mark doesn’t even realize that was the wrong move until Donghyuck sits up on his bed abruptly, his short brown hair spiked up in every direction. “Is that an indirect confession?” he asks with his eyebrows raised, his tongue peeking out from between his teeth threateningly. He always looks like a threat, and Mark hates the fact that it matches his lyrics perfectly.

“It’s not about you, dude!” Mark huffs frustrated, looking down at his desk again to try to hide his flaming face. He’s so easily flustered, always in flames around Donghyuck. “Drop it, seriously. It’s- It’s kind of embarrassing.”

The mattress creaks and the sheets rustle as Donghyuck moves around in bed. All of a sudden he’s standing next to Mark’s chair. “What’s embarrassing? That people think it’s about me?” he asks, far too tentatively to be a joke. “Or is it your writing that makes you feel embarrassed?”

“It’s just-” Mark considers the question, frowning at his notebook once again. “I think it’s everything? I mean, I don’t even know, man.”

“I’ve tried writing a song before,” Donghyuck confesses, moving closer to lean against Mark’s desk. “And it was a _mess_ ,” he admits, giggling at the end. Mark looks up at him with wide eyes because, if he knows a bigger perfectionist than himself, that’s gotta be Donghyuck. “You made it into an album, you can’t suck that much,” Donghyuck tells him with a knowing smirk, reaching across Mark’s desk to press his palm flat on top of Mark’s hand, successfully stopping Mark’s fingers from tapping his notebook nervously.

“I’m not as good as Taeyong, though,” Mark points out, eyes fixed on their joined hands, lips pursed to stop himself from smiling giddily at the half-hidden compliment.

Donghyuck snorts too loud to be genuine, his hand pressing harder against Mark’s. “You’re always doing that, trying to skip all the steps.”

“What does that even mean?”

Donghyuck stares down at him with a blank face before he says, “Taeyong hyung’s been writing for _years_ , Mark.” And Mark hates how easily Donghyuck slides the honorific next to Taeyong’s name even when he’s not around, as if the words are meant to roll off his tongue hand-in-hand. “Oh my god, stop frowning!” Donghyuck yells into his face, his other hand coming up to press his fingers right between Mark’s eyebrows. “I really like the song, in case you didn’t get it because you’re slow like that.”

“I’m not slow, you’re just annoying,” Mark says, and wraps his own hand around Donghyuck’s wrist to tug it off and away from his face. He is starting to boil under his skin, Donghyuck’s double-sided praises along with his hand still on top of Mark are setting him on fire from inside out. There’s just so much of Donghyuck Mark can handle before he starts to suffocate. “I never know when you’re serious,” he mumbles, tugging his other hand from underneath Donghyuck’s. He has to rub his palm against his pants to get rid of the sweat and the annoying tingling sensation.

“It’s not my fault that you’re too dumb to understand my amazing sense of humor, _hyung,_ ” Donghyuck pouts, crossing his arms over his chest cutely before he’s breaking into a loopsided smirk one more time (always contradicting, always dizzying). “I just think it’s pretty cool to have someone writing about you like that, you know? You don’t have to be embarrassed Mark, I’m not mad that you’re writing about me.”

Mark doesn’t even have the energy to reply, he can only gape at Donghyuck’s retreating form when he walks out of their room, voice sickeningly sweet as he sings _baby, is it me or are you doing something to me?_

Donghyuck doesn’t sing with that high-pitched baby voice he used to have when Mark first met him. His voice is full now, smooth and pretty and sticky like honey. It gets stuck in Mark’s head for the rest of the day.

\---

Mark always tries not to worry too much about his physical appearance. He tells himself time and time again that, if he doesn’t care what others look like, he shouldn’t care what he himself looks like, either. In the end, what matters is what he _does_. If he improves enough to steal people’s breath with his performance, nothing else should matter.

It gets difficult to maintain this mindset when you’re neck-deep in an industry where, most times, a pretty face and a slim body matter more than being able to sing and dance properly at the same time.

The stylists are there to help them, their company wouldn’t want them to be looking ugly in front of the cameras, Mark reminds himself, but that doesn’t mean he has to like everything they do to him. He knows he isn’t ugly, he’s got a fairly average face that can even look pretty with the right amount of makeup to cover those pimples he never seems to be able to get rid of, and the stubble he isn’t yet accustomed to. He’s not an ugly guy, but it sure feels like it every time he runs his hands through his dry hair, rough under his pads with bleach and too much hair dye.

“Does it feel like a scarecrow or does it only look like it?” Donghyuck asks when he flops down next to Mark in the couch of the recording room.

That is bold coming from Donghyuck, when his hair is styled in a bowl-cut that’s too short for him, the strands of his fringe don’t even reach his eyebrows. He looks cute anyway, though, with soft, full cheeks that he’s somehow managed to keep despite all the changes time has carved in his body (they seem to be getting slimmer lately, but he never loses his baby face). That’s what infuriates Mark the most.

“Have you ever touched a scarecrow?” Mark asks him, his fingers still running through his own hair. His hand gets stuck in the strands sometimes, all knotted up even though it’s gel-free.

“Well, no, but you get me,” Donghyuck shrugs. He reaches out to touch Mark’s hair himself, the palm of his hand pressing the top of Mark’s head softly, trying to flatten the strands of hair against his skull. “Feels like a scouring sponge,” Donghyuck giggles, his eyes all squinted and cheeks puffed out with laugher. Mark kind of wants to squeeze him, so he drops his hands and tucks them between his thighs. “It bounces back up! It’s so cute, though.”

And Mark really should get used to it, the random compliments falling so easily from Donghyuck’s lips as if they mean nothing. But they mean a lot more to Mark than he would ever dare to admit out loud. He even has trouble admitting it to himself, how much he enjoys the validation, how nice inside sweet words make him feel, the insecurities he doesn’t want to acknowledge put to rest even if it’s only for a few seconds.

He doesn’t say any of this out loud, mouth too dry to speak. Mark stays perfectly still as Donghyuck keeps running his fingers through Mark’s hair, curling the strands around his digits, sliding his pads over Mark’s scalp and down, down, down, until his tips brush the shell of Mark’s ear. If he can feel how hot they are, he doesn’t mention it.

Donghyuck is still smiling softly, as if his lips are meant to be laughing, but he’s too caught up to go through with it. He doesn’t seem to be aware of the effect he has on Mark, struggling to stay in one piece as everything inside of him melts into something warm, body tingling everywhere.

“You’re cute,” Mark retaliates, far too late, out of place, short of breath.

Donghyuck’s eyes snap down to Mark’s face, blinking as if he’s been woken up from a trance. “Oh, shut up, Mark Lee,” he mumbles, disentangling his hand from Mark’s hair. “I look like a chestnut,” and he gets up and away so fast that Mark wonders if he’s imagined the pink on Donghyuck’s round cheeks.

Mark feels incredibly relieved, but at the same time his hands itch with the need to tug Donghyuck close again, to get him to stay.

But Donghyuck is already walking away, giggling (loud, too loud) when Mark screams after him, “It’s Mark hyung for you, dude!”

\---

Lately, Donghyuck is all pale skin, red-rimmed eyes and shaky fingers. He’s tangled hair and pink lips bitten raw and grey smudges under his eyes. Unless they are in an official schedule, Donghyuck is all rumpled clothes, unsteady feet and not-so-full cheeks that keep getting slimmer and slimmer as the days go by.

Mark recognizes the signs easily because he’s been through it all before, back when they were still trainees, back when he could still _afford it_. But Donghyuck is playing a dangerous game, sneaking into their shared room past midnight, when he thinks Mark is already asleep, and waking up before the sun is up. He’s juggling with official schedules, official performances with two subunits, and extra practice, holding onto all of it with jittery hands and ruined nails that don’t seem his. And Mark refuses to stand by watching until everything inevitably slips between Donghyuck’s fingers, crashing down and cracking him open in the process.

So, just one more night, when the clock on his bedside table hits 3 in the morning and the bed next to his is still perfectly made and empty, Mark grabs the first jacked he can reach from his closet, slips his feet into a pair of sneakers he isn’t even sure are his, and walks all the way to their practice room.

“Hyuck, this needs to stop,” that is the first thing he says when he steps into the room, walking directly towards the computer to pause the music.

Donghyuck halts mid-movement, stands in the middle of the room drenched in sweat, his sports t-shirt so wet that it clings to the skin of his shoulders. He doesn’t turn around to face Mark, he stares at him through the mirror, surprise running through his flushed face as he pushes his damp hair away from his forehead with a hand. Even from where he’s standing, Mark can appreciate the slight tremble of his fingers, the weakness on his knees.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he frowns at Mark through the mirror, his face hardening impossibly as he spits the words through gritted teeth. “Are you wearing pajamas? Seriously, Mark?”

Mark is caught off guard for a second. He slides his eyes down to look at his own body, the loose cuffs of his pajama pants pooling around his untied sneakers. He didn’t even think of changing into something decent before he left the dorms, his mind too filled with worry to work out any coherent thought.

“Who even cares?” he croaks back as he walks towards Donghyuck. He knows he’s blushing, but he can blame it on the worry and anger instead of the embarrassment and vulnerability that are almost choking him. “The point is, what are _you_ doing here?”

“What does it look like to you?” Donghyuck is still running his eyes up and down Mark’s body, the original surprise on his face completely washed away and replaced by that cruel twist of his mouth that shows up whenever he’s ready to attack. “Use your brain, Mark, I know you can.”

“Don’t talk to me like that, Donghyuck,” Mark warns him, lifting his right hand to stick his index finger right into Donghyuck’s chest. His clothes are so overused that the fabric is soaked under Mark’s pad, he reeks of sweat, and his heart is punching his ribs so fast that Mark doesn’t need to press the rest of his hand against his chest to feel it. “Drop the act, I’m here for _you_.”

It takes more than that to calm a thunderstorm, though, Mark knows it well. He isn’t surprised when Donghyuck swats his hand away and takes a step back. “I don’t need you to be here for me. I’m good.”

“You’re overworking yourself!” Mark is so exasperated that he ends up yelling. He was never a loud person until Donghyuck decided to burst into his life, turned him loud for all the right and wrong reasons. Loud laughter, loud anger, and confusion so loud that sometimes Mark can’t even breathe.

“Says you,” Donghyuck scoffs, puffs his chest out because he’s never been one to walk away from a fight, and screams just as loud, “How can you be so hypocritical?”

Somehow, bitter words hurt twice as much when they come in Donghyuck’s voice. Mark is used to the spite, Donghyuck carries it around like a second skin, but he isn’t good at handling it if it’s not intertwined with a joke, or with something even sweeter. Mark’s used to bitter words, but only when they come from himself.

“But you don't even _need_ it!” he’s still screaming, yells twice and his throat already starts to burn.

Donghyuck rolls his eyes at him, taking another step backward as if he can’t even stand being next to Mark at the moment. “As if you do!” he yells right back, arm outstretched to keep Mark away. But Mark chases after him. Tt feels like the natural thing to do between them, closing the gaps since day one.

They won’t get anywhere talking about this. Mark has no idea what version of him Donghyuck perceives through his eyes, but he does know that it has never added up to the version of himself inside of Mark’s head. So Mark closes his eyes for a second, breathes in deep through his nose to calm the irrational anger running through him like lava, and rubs at his face with his hands to keep himself grounded.

Donghyuck’s a storm after all, uncontrollable and untamable, and Mark can be blown away by him in a second if he isn’t careful enough.

“Listen, it’s just. This is not like you,” Mark tells him, quietly now, gesturing with his hands towards Donghyuck’s drenched body. Even standing all proud and steady in his anger, he still looks incredibly hollow, exhaustion clinging to every bit of him. _You’re smarter than me_ , Mark wants to say. “You always know your limits,” he says instead. “You’re like this ‘cause something’s wrong.”

Donghyuck seems to get even bigger for a second, his chest swelling as he takes a deep breath. He ends up turning around, giving his back to Mark right before his shoulders slump. It’s only when Donghyuck’s back starts to shake that Mark realizes what’s happening.

It’s at times like this when Mark desperately wishes gentleness could be learned. It’s printed into his mind like a stamp made of fire, the memory of Donghyuck’s tender fingers dancing along the bruised skin of Mark’s knees. He wants to gift something like that back so badly, Mark wants to offer a soft side of himself that he isn’t even sure that exists.

He takes a tentative step closer, placing one of his hands on Donghyuck’s shoulder, squeezing firmly just to let him know he’s not alone. He doesn’t have to go through whatever it is alone, even if Mark doesn’t know how to handle it.

“I just can’t focus on anything,” Donghyuck blurts out, choked between ragged breaths. He’s still turned away from Mark, curled into himself, but Mark can hear the thickness of tears in his words. “I keep thinking about my mom and- and my siblings. And I can’t fucking focus on the job, I fuck up _all the time_.”

Mark wants to cut him off, promise Donghyuck that he’s been nothing but _clean_ since the day they debuted, and even before that (Mark would know better than anyone, he’s never stopped looking). He wants to shush Donghyuck and assure him that no one thinks he’s been slacking off, wants to remind him that he’s been _born to shine_ , no matter how empty the words might sound to Mark when he makes them about himself, because they are nothing but true when it comes to Donghyuck.

He only clutches Donghyuck’s shoulder tighter, harsher than he should, scared he’ll stop talking if Mark dares to interrupt him.

“It's so ridiculous, you- you know?” Donghyuck hiccups. “There are so many people here, in my damn group, who have it so much harder than I do.”

He turns around then, rubbing his wet face against the inside of his elbow roughly. When his arm falls limp to his side, he isn’t crying anymore, but his cheeks are redder than Mark’s ever seen them, eyes glistening under the bright lights of the practice room. He’s still cute, even like this.

“How do you stay focused when you aren't even in your home country? Like, you can’t even visit your brother if you wanted to. And here I am crying when my mom is just a few hours away from me,” Donghyuck finishes with a broken laugh, something wrong and mean. He’s always unapologetically mean, but it’s always twice as bad when it’s aimed at himself (Mark hates that he can see himself in it).

“Hyuck,” Mark finally speaks up, bringing his hand up to Donghyuck’s shoulder one more time, crumpling the damp fabric of his shirt between his fingers. “Someone else having it harder than you doesn't make your feelings any less important,” he says, ducking his head in an attempt at catching Donghyuck’s eyes.

It’s such a weird sight, the way Donghyuck shies away from Mark’s gaze, biting his lower lip in shame. Mark never thought playing role-reversal could feel so wrong. “It’s fucking embarrassing,” Donghyuck spits, talking to the floor.

“Your feelings are never embarrassing,” Mark shakes him a bit, gripping at Donghyuck’s shoulder even harder, wishing he could have better words to offer.

He doesn’t expect Donghyuck to break into a giggle, but he does. All of a sudden, he’s smiling at Mark small and soft, with that look in his eye that makes Mark feel like he’s being stripped deep to his bones. “You should listen to your own advice once in a while,” Donghyuck tells him, head tilted to the side as he gauges Mark’s reaction with a crooked eyebrow.

Mark’s face is twisting into a pout before he can help himself. “Shut up, dude,” he’s the one shying away from Donghyuck now, going back to familiar waters as he punches Donghyuck’s shoulder. And Donghyuck’s reply is a loud, chirpy giggle, familiar enough to have Mark cracking a smile despite the worry that’s still rotting in his chest.

“I’m just worried about you,” Mark admits with a small mouth, eyes pointed to the floor.

“I got that much,” Donghyuck moves closer now, his still shaky fingers curling into the cuffs of Mark’s jacket to bring him closer. “You’re so cute, hyung,” he coos, smirking knowingly.

Mark doesn’t know if Donghyuck keeps complimenting him just to tease him, or if it’s because he genuinely means his words, but it always causes Mark to go weak at the knees, no matter the reason. There is not enough time for Mark to dwell over the words, though, because Donghyuck is tugging him closer, closer, _closer_ , until he can pull him into a hug.

It is awkward, uncomfortable even, with Donghyuck’s body still reeking of sweat and sticking to Mark’s pajamas. But they make it work somehow, even if Mark’s never been prone to physical affection and his arms are way too stiff when he wraps them tentatively around Donghyuck’s waist. Donghyuck sighs happily anyway, nuzzling Mark’s neck with his nose, getting the skin there wet with the tears that are still painting his cheeks.

“Just let me take you home before you get hurt,” Mark mumbles into Donghyuck’s damp hair. His voice is coming out wobbly and weird, low in a pitch he’s never heard coming from himself before. His heart is skyrocketing in his chest, crawling all the way up his chest to settle in his throat, making it hard to breathe. “I will stay behind with you tomorrow if you still want to practice more, but let’s rest now.”

They’ve hugged before, but never like this. Donghyuck keeps pressing closer as if he’s trying to carve a place for himself in the crook of Mark’s neck, somewhere to hide when he doesn't feel like being seen (and Mark has always thought Donghyuck was one of those people who didn't care about standing out, but maybe he just doesn’t have a choice. Even the strongest people need a break, a place where they can shine only half-bright).

Vertigo is the word Mark chooses to name whatever he’s feeling. He doesn’t think it’s the right one, but it’s the only thing he can come up with to explain the dizziness that takes all over him as he hangs onto the wet material of Donghyuck’s shirt with claw-like fingers. He digs his pads into the heated flesh of Donghyck’s sides as he wills himself to stay grounded, and stays right there until his heart swells so big that he can’t breathe anymore.

Mark squeezes Donghyuck’s waist once more before he’s pushing him back firmly, arms outstretched so Donghyuck can’t step closer again, keeping him far enough to be able to think straight again.

Donghyuck pushes his mouth down into a pout, but he doesn’t complain, doesn’t try to break into Mark’s personal space again. “So thoughtful, aren’t you?” he says, the edges of his mouth curling upward into that familiar smirk Mark knows by heart now. “I have a lot to learn from you, hyung.”

And Mark is left breathless once again, high on the praise as he thinks: I've learned it all from you. But he’s unable to find the words or the gentleness to let Donghyuck know.

\---

After debut, Mark learns to share the stage, and to smile at fans, and to speak into a mic loud enough to be heard even if he keeps stuttering over his words. He learns to turn his thoughts into poetry, and his poetry into songs, and then he learns to share them with the world. After debut, Mark still doesn’t know how to cook, but he learns to get rid of his shame for long enough to ask someone else to do it for him. He also learns that those around him don’t seem as invincible as they look like. He learns that Donghyuck, in all his pride and fury, is just as human as Mark himself. After debut, Mark still kicks and punches and pinches when he laughs, he’s still rough and hard and harsh in his happiness, but he keeps laughing out loud. He doesn’t know how to offer comfort through touch, how to soothe someone else with the right words, how to stop people from breaking down. But he finds out that, sometimes, a pair of rough hands and open arms are more than good enough.

After debut, Mark learns that, even if he’s stiff and cold and clumsy, Donghyuck can melt and mold him into something soft for a little while, as long as Mark allows him to (and he allows him to, sometimes only, because it never stops being dizzying). After debut, Mark learns to admit to himself that there’s a boy with enough power over him to leave him breathless, render him speechless, set him on fire. As scary as it is, after debut, Mark learns to admit to himself (and to himself only) that sometimes (and sometimes only) he likes to be blown away by the hurricane that is Donghyuck.

\---

If there is one single thing Mark can take pride in, it is his honesty.

When he’s given a list of positive adjectives during an interview and he’s told to rate himself, he only needs to look once at the members around him to remember he isn’t anything special.

Mark doesn’t think low of himself, he’s simply not as masculine as Jaehyung or Jeno, not as charismatic as Taeyong or Jaemin, or not as outgoing as Johnny or Renjun. He’s not as positive as Jungwoo or Lucas, not half as funny as Chenle, and definitely not as bright and different (in the right way, always in all the right ways) as Donghyuck. Mark is average, this is just a fact.

He feels lucky to be surrounded by such talented people, presented with the golden opportunity to draw knowledge from them and and use it to keep growing, growing, growing. Mark has learned a lot since he first joined this industry and, after all these years, his members still influence him constantly, shaping him into someone better each day that goes by.

But, when he stops to think of ways he could have influenced these people in the same positive way, he comes out empty.

His answers aren’t that high, but at least they are honest.

Mark barely remembers this interview by the day he gets back to the dorm to find a magazine on his bed. It’s open right on the page with his answers, but everything is doodled over with a permanent silver marker.

At first, Mark gets angry. He replied honestly, and he likes to believe no one knows him better than himself.

He grabs the magazine with harsh fingers, crumpling the pages a little as he brings it closer to his face. But then, he sees all his ones and twos crossed over, upgraded to fours and fives in every category of the test, and his anger melts into warmth so fast that his skin heats up.

He’s been part of this industry for over a year now, he’s grown into his famous persona, learned to fill up almost every bend and edge of it even if not properly. He is used to being liked, people from all over the world who don’t even know him keep praising him. But Mark is still a sucker for sweet things, no matter how much time goes by and how rough he thinks he is.

And it’s always better like this, when it comes from someone who knows him first-hand, who’s been with Mark since he was a little kid with glasses too big for him and teeth so crooked that he didn’t even dare to smile. Someone who’s seen him stumble over Korean words, and get mad at unimportant things, and overwork himself until he couldn’t even stand straight anymore.

Things have always hit twice as hard when they come from Donghyuck. Because it’s Donghyuck’s handwriting on the magazine, elegant and pretty like the rest of him, so familiar to Mark like the rest of him.

Mark can’t help blushing, can’t stop the smile that blooms on his face at the tickling feeling in his belly. He tries to keep it down, presses his lips together and runs a hand over his face, rough to try to rub the giddiness away. But he can’t get rid of the simmering in his stomach, something gentle and sweet that feels like those butterflies people write songs about.

There’s more than numbers written in the magazine. There is also that one section called _Romantic Nature_ that Mark didn’t pay any mind to because he doesn’t have enough knowledge or experience to rate himself. Donghyuck wrote right under that section, clear and firm and _pretty_ : ‘take me out so I can find out’.

And he’s probably joking, Donghyuck is always probably joking. But suddenly Mark is so glad to be alone, because he feels warm all the way down to his thighs, giddy in a way he’s never felt before. He has to cover his face with his hands, his cheeks fever-hot under his sweaty palms as he squeals against his own skin.

He doesn’t even know what he’s feeling, but it is too nice to handle. Mark believes that he could burst with it, and the thought alone is terrifying.

\---

Mark can barely handle it when he’s alone. He can’t handle it at all when he’s on the spot, surrounded by cameras and prying eyes.

He’s never been good with attention, which is fucking unfair, considering how badly he yearns for it. But small displays of validation in passing are not the same as a bunch of cameras zooming on his face.

It has taken Mark years, but he's managed to get used to Donghyuck's closeness.

It's just one more thing Mark has to admire of him: the easiness with which Donghyuck handles people, he gifts out affection as if he's overflowing with it, he intertwines his body with others as if he's so sure of himself, he isn't scared to get too close, offer too much, and lose something vital in the process.

Even though he's gotten better at it through the years, Mark still lives on guard, constantly tensed up like a barbed wire, ready to snap and scratch whenever someone gets too close for comfort. Donghyuck just happens to know how to smooth him over, iron him all nice and mellow with pretty words and the right touches on all of his right places.

But too many eyes on him and lenses flashing across his face make Mark feel like a trapped animal, showcased up for everyone to admire, break apart, and dissect. He has been made to shine, they say, but all these years in the spotlight only seem to have worn him out. Donghyuck's hands all over him keep peeling him open, and Mark isn't sure he wants all these people to know what he looks like on the inside.

The worst part is that Mark has had the chance to say something about it, and he couldn’t take it.

Donghyuck was slotted next to him on the couch during a movie night, every curve of his body clicking perfectly into Mark's nooks, feeling so close together in front of the other members that Mark started to have trouble breathing. It was stupid, the sensation that his body was melting into Donghyuck's, deep enough for it to stop feeling his own completely, and countless pairs of eyes on them to witness his loss.

Mark had started to squirm on the couch, his shoulder bumping against Donghyuck's chest harshly, hands kneading at the thigh Donghyuck had thrown over Mark's legs.

"Are you uncomfortable?" Donghyuck had whispered, so intimately intertwined with Mark that his lips brushed over Mark's collarbone, sending a jolt down his entire body (it's always been lightning with him, breathtaking and deathly). "You can tell me if I'm ever too much."

Hearing those words coming from Donghyuck's lips, slurred in his sweet, sleepy voice, was a little heartbreaking. _You're never too much_ , Mark wanted to tell him, _I'm just too little_.

"I'm just too hot," Mark had replied instead, his voice coming out high-pitched and way too loud in the quiet of the dim room (he's always way too loud lately).

All eyes were on him in a second, amused glances and snickering mouths focused on him as he squirmed uncomfortably on the couch, pale cheeks turning deep red not for the attention, but due to Donghyuck breathing heavily into his neck. "You're so funny, hyung," he had whispered into Mark's flushed skin. So Mark had pushed him away, choked out and out of breath.

Mark _knows_ there must be a gentle way to reject someone, but his rough hands and sharp lines have yet to learn how to spell out tenderness. He's always digging sharp nails into Donghyuck's soft shoulders and pushing him away. He's always sinking pointy elbows into Donghyuck's soft stomach and shoving him out of the way. He's always curling rough fingers around Donghyuck's delicate wrists to keep him at arm-length.

And Donghyuck never resists, but he looks less and less bright each time.

"I've already said that you can tell me if I'm ever too much," he's saying now, his soft face hardened into sharp lines, turned into steel the only way Mark can achieve. "You don't have to be a fucking dick about it."

"I wasn't- I didn't mean to be rude or something," Mark tells him, trying to keep his voice quiet. They are backstage after recording a variety show, he doesn't want all these cameramen and random people hearing their business. "I just needed space."

"Well, you could've _said something_ ," Donghyuck repeats, his voice growing higher as he crosses his arms over his chest defensively. "But don't worry, I get it, I'll leave you alone."

He's turning around and walking away before Mark can fight back. He doesn't even know if it can be called a fight. Mark feels ambushed and stepped over, even if it was his own fault. Still, he runs after Donghyuck, grips his wrist, and tugs, (roughly, always roughly) trying to close the gap between them before it's too late.

"Stop it, that's not what I want," Mark _whines_.

When Donghyuck turns around to look him in the eye, he breaks his wrist free from Mark's grip with a single clean pull, and he glares at Mark with an unimpressed eyebrow raised. "What do you even want, then?"

But, as good as Mark can be when it comes to written words, he's never been half as bright when it comes to spoken feelings. He stays standing there, head ducked down under the prying eyes that surround them, mouthing at the floor as he tries to come up with something that will make sense out loud.

Donghyuck's never been the one to stick around waiting for a reply, though, so he huffs and walks away.

\---

Mark isn't a stranger to an angry Donghyuck. He's learned how to fight thanks to him, after all.

Donghyuck screaming into his face, sneaking his warm hands into Mark's body just to turn him inside out, grabbing at Mark's ugliest parts to display them in front of him, so Mark can't run away from them—it may sound like a nightmare, but it is _familiar_. That's what Mark is used to, all of Donghyuck's attention focused on him, sticky and overwhelming and dizzying. He desperately wants it back.

What is not familiar is this silent version of Donghyuck. It turns out that, when he said he would leave Mark alone, he _meant_ it. They haven’t talked in weeks, Mark is so angry about it that he’s cursed him in his head a thousand times over—he’s called him childish and a brat and a little kid and everything Donghyuck hates to be called. He’s never said any of it out loud, though, because Mark’s never been good at putting up a fight, and much less at seeking out a war. The worst part is that Mark is half sure Donghyuck hasn’t spared him a single thought, and the ugly, scary truth is that he would trade a million jabs to his pride for a second of Donghyuck’s time.

Until now, Mark hadn't realized how _seen_ he'd always felt thanks to Donghyuck. It seems ridiculous when he thinks about it, how much importance he gives to half-compliments hidden between wicked smiles and mean jokes, but he feels more average than ever now that he doesn't have Donghyuck's voice subtly praising him.

He's never been a jealous person, he doesn't even have anyone to be jealous of, it's not as if Donghyuck has replaced him with anyone else. But that might be worse, Donghyuck taking all this attention away from Mark and keeping it to himself, just because Mark doesn't deserve it, not anymore.

"C'mon Mark, let's do this," Johnny is saying now, his right elbow resting on top of one of the tables in the waiting room as he beckons Mark closer with his fingers.

Mark knows it is dumb to compare his 18-year-old body to Johnny's of all people, but when he kneels down in front of him and props his arm on the table in front of Johnny's he can't help but notice the difference in size. Mark has been going to the gym regularly since he debuted, but he's starting to think that maybe it's not enough.

"You think you can handle me?" Johnny asks him with a wink. Mark laughs when Johnny grabs his hand, bigger fingers than Mark's wrapping around his pale hand with a strength Mark can only dream of having, and they haven't even started yet.

"Please, don't break me," Mark jokes, his own fingers white-padded around Johnny's.

"Alright," Jaehyun walks towards them, places both of his hands on top of theirs, and Mark can't help but get caught on how tiny his own looks right now. "At the count of three. One, two, three!"

It's over as soon as it starts, Mark can't last more than two seconds trying to keep up with Johnny's strength. Johnny smashes the back of Mark's hand against the table while laughing, as easy as breathing.

"Gotta go back to the gym, kid," Taeyong ruffles his hair when Mark doesn't immediately move, only bends his head between his arms as Johnny keeps laughing louder and louder.

"Shut up, hyung. You lost two seconds ago," Mark mumbles into the crook of his elbow, ducking away from Taeyong's touch.

It's a game, it's supposed to be _fun_ , but Mark has never been good at finding the fun of things he isn't good at. He laughs anyway—high-pitched and genuine because Johnny's laughter is that contagious—but when he raises his head he can feel his cheeks getting fever-hot with embarrassment.

"Don't get up," Donghyuck's voice breaks through the laughter.

Mark's head snaps towards him so fast that he almost goes dizzy. He follows him with his eyes as Donghyuck moves around the table to push Johnny away so he can kneel down in his place.

"Mark hyung is a weakling, maybe I can win this one," he says, and he's smiling at everyone but Mark. Suddenly, the honorific doesn't feel as good as it used to feel.

He doesn't look at Mark until they are already holding hands—Donghyuck is warm, so warm against Mark's cold but sweaty palm—and, for once, Mark can't tear his eyes away from Donghyuck's. It feels like they haven't looked directly at each other's faces in years, and Mark goes a little breathless when Donghyuck's mouth crooks into that familiar wicked smirk of his, threatening and beautiful.

"Focus, asshole," he tells Mark, squeezing his hand hard in warning before Jaehyun starts the countdown.

Even though it is difficult to focus, Mark wins this round pretty easily, breath caught in his throat and hand so sweaty that his grip is almost slippery. Still, he can tell Donghyuck is doing his best, eyes screwed shut as he grips Mark's hands so hard that his knuckles go white, painful in the best kind of way.

Donghyuck _tries_ , he goes down with a smirk, and Mark has never been more thankful for him.

"He's tougher than he looks, hyung," Donghyuck whines to Taeyong afterward, his full lips pursed into a pout as he wiggles his shoulders in annoyance.

He doesn't look Mark's way for the rest of the day, but he still manages to make him feel better than anyone else ever could.

\---

"Did you really need to change the choreography?" Mark says, screams almost, once they get off the stage. "Was that necessary?"

Donghyuck doesn't turn around to look at him, he keeps walking towards their changing room, one of his hands playing with the in-ears he's got hanging from his neck as if they are a lot more interesting and important than anything Mark could say. But, for once, Mark's tired enough to start a war.

"Are you even listening to me?" he full-on yells now, reaching out to grab the back of Donghyuck's shirt and force him to come to a stop. Mark feels itchy all over, his body sweating and tingling not only due to the exhaustion after a performance, but for the heads that are turning around to stare at them. Donghyuck gives him an unimpressed once-over when he turns around as if Mark is as important as the dirt under his feet, and Mark's had _enough_. "Can you stop acting like a fucking little kid for a single second?"

The words work like a magic trick, the indifference in Donghyuck's face turns into anger as quick as the blink of an eye, chest puffed out as if he's getting ready to unravel the storm that's always rumbling inside of him. Mark waits, his shoulders set like a barbed wire, ready to snap.

Right when Donghyuck is opening his mouth to reply, taking a step closer to Mark, Renjun steps between the two of them, pushing each of his hands flat against their chests. "Not here, dumbasses," he huffs, looking between them with bored eyes. "If you wanna fight it out, you do it in private."

"Yeah, alright," Donghyuck reaches past Renjun then, fingers curling into Mark's shoulder with a harshness that reminds Mark of himself. "We're fighting it out right now."

The next thing he knows, Mark is being dragged across the crowded hallways of a TV set, bumping into staff and artists he doesn't know as he tries to keep up with Donghyuck's hurried, angry pace. Donghyuck doesn't stop until he gets to a dark, empty room changing room, and then he's pushing Mark inside, closing the door after them with a bang.

"What the hell is your problem?" Donghyuck snaps at him, resting his back against the closed door as he crosses his arms over his chest, the way he always does when he feels threatened. "Finally got the guts to tell me what you think to my face?"

It is quite dark in the room, the only light source being a small opaque window on the wall opposite the door. Mark could get walk closer and turn on the lights to see Donghyuck's face properly. But that would mean allowing Donghyuck to see Mark better, too, and Mark already feels vulnerable enough, out of his element as he shifts his weight from one foot to the other in front of a Donghyuck hard as steel and unpredictable as the rain.

"Why do you keep changing the choreography?" Mark asks, setting his back into a straight line and puffing his chest out. If it's about work, he can handle it. That's the only thing he has under control (most times, at least).

If Mark wasn't so riled up, the question itself would embarrass him. It's not a big deal—Donghyuck refusing to rest his hand on Mark's shoulder at the start of the song—it doesn't even affect the dance itself. But Donghyuck has been looking past Mark for so long now, Mark kind of wants to lie down on the floor and throw a tantrum until Donghyuck is looking at him and him only.

"I don't wanna fucking touch you, that's why," Donghyuck replies, fast as if he's had the answer ready for a while, tongue-sharped and aimed where it hurts worst.

Mark's deflates so fast, all his fake confidence flowing out the tiny window on the wall at Donghyuck's roughness. He's used to it, he _knows_ Donghyuck always aims for your weakest spots with the most venomous words. Mark is the person he knows best, so Donghyuck never misses.

"Why?" Mark asks as steadily as he can, curling his fingers into balls, always-bitten nails digging into the sweaty palms of his hands.

"Why? Seriously?" Donghyuck _laughs_ , fake and cruel and everything-but-sweet. "That's what you wanted, isn't it? Me leaving you alone? You simply didn’t have the guts to say it out loud."

Donghyuck pushes himself off the door, walking towards Mark with firm steps until their feet are almost touching. He looks so much older when he's angry, his still round face impossibly hardened, soft cheeks looking almost out of place in the coldness of his features. It always messes with Mark's brain, the way Donghyuck can exist both so gently and sharply at the same time. He kind of want to reach out and smooth his hands over the edge of Donghyuck's jaw, just to test if the touch cuts as easily as his words.

"You're letting our childish fight affect our job?" Mark snaps back at him, setting his shoulders again and lifting his chin, gaze focused on the straight line of Donghyuck's mouth so he doesn't have to look him in the eyes. "I thought you were more mature than that, Hyuck."

"Don't _Hyuck_ me right now," Donghyuck pushes at Mark's chest once, hard. "Stop treating me like a little kid. Stop deflecting, we both know this isn't about work," he keeps talking, hitting Mark's chest repeatedly now, his voice rising higher and higher with each push. "And look me in the eyes, dammit."

"Stop it!" Mark brings his own hands up, curling them around both of Donghyuck's wrists forcefully, gripping tight enough to keep him in place. "I never- I never asked you to leave me alone! You didn't even talk to me about it, you just-"

"I asked you! More than once! So don't treat me like I'm crazy or something," they are so close now, Donghyuck's breath hits Mark straight on the face when he screams at him. Mark keeps his eyes trained on his full lips, his sweaty hands firm around Donghyuck's arms, Donghyuck's pulse jumping under his pads almost frantically. "Stop looking at my mouth! You wanna kiss me or something?" he spits out after a strong heartbeat, the seam of his lips curling upward into that wicked smile Mark could draw with his eyes closed.

That's when Mark loses himself once again, his heart thrumming on his temples at the same pace as Donghyuck's, still clattering under Mark's thumbs. He's lost, so lost in the twist of Donghyuck's smile, that he ends up leaning in, pressing his lips hard against Donghyuck's in a useless attempt at finding himself there, somehow.

It's weird, uncomfortable even. Mark has never kissed anyone before—hasn't had the time or energy to even think about it—and he's never been made for gentle touches and tender moves. He pushes too hard, rough enough to hurt, his closed mouth pressed still against Donghyuck's plush lips for an infinite moment. And Mark swears Donghyuck's heart stops beating underneath his hands until he draws back.

"I like it," Mark blurts out before he can put his thoughts in order and backtrack, before Donghyuck can put his own thoughts in order and turn Mark inside out one more time. "When you touch me. I like it," he confesses with closed eyes. He's whispering, still close to Donghyuck's face, so close that their noses bump together when he talks. "It's just- I can't breathe, sometimes," his grip on Donghyuck's wrists weakens, giving him the chance to back down if he wants to. But Donghyuck doesn't move away, he only gets his wrists out of Mark's grip to slide his fingers into their place, his hands (always warm, always gentle) curling around Mark's cold, sweaty ones slowly. "Can't breathe when there's, like, people around us. I just can't-"

"It's alright," Donghyuck cuts in. Mark doesn't dare to open his eyes yet, but he feels Donghyuck tilting his head enough to rest their foreheads together. His lips brush against Mark's when he whispers again, "It's okay," quieter than Mark has ever heard him.

Mark swallows hard, squeezing his fingers around Donghyuck's just to make sure this is real. "Yeah?"

"Yes. I get it. It's alright," Donghyuck mumbles again. He's pulling away then, but he tugs Mark along with him. Mark keeps his eyes closed, his hands twisted tightly around Donghyuck's as he allows himself to be led blindly. Donghyuck only stops once his back hits the closed door. "Just. Just kiss me again."

"Fuck," Mark opens his eyes then, only to find Donghyuck's closed, his face relaxed into soft, curved lines. He's flushed, cheeks so pretty-pink that Mark can see it even in the dim light of the room, it almost matches the current red color of his hair. "I should," he tries as he leans in one more time, brushing his nose against Donghyuck's as gently as he can manage. "I have to take you out. You said that- Dang, I don't even know what I'm doing. I just-"

"Mark, shut up," Donghyuck cracks one eye open enough to squint at Mark, one of his eyebrows crooked, unimpressed. Mark can't help the giggle that bursts out of him, pitched high and sounding happier than he's felt in a while. He's going a little cross-eyed trying to look at Donghyuck this close, but he refuses to draw back in case Donghyuck slips away between his fingers once again. "This is good," Donghyuck whispers, eyes fluttering closed again.

Mark kisses him one more time, then. It's more careful, slower, but still clumsy. It starts as an innocent press of lips against Donghyuck's closed mouth, and then Mark is moving, brushing his lips over Donghyuck's tender skin as softly as he can, almost feather-light. He doesn't know what he's doing, but Donghyuck ends up smiling into it, and Mark takes the chance to draw the twist of his smile with his tongue.

"You're good," Donghyuck speaks again, right into Mark's mouth. He disentangles their fingers just so he can wrap his arms around Mark's neck instead, locking his wrists together to cage him against his body, as if he's just as scared of having Mark slipping away from him. "You're more than good."

At that moment, Mark doesn't think he can feel better than this, with Donghyuck kissing praises into his lips as if he's asking Mark to steal his words and make them his own.

They stay there for so long that the van leaves without them. They don't talk about it, but they end up walking home together. Donghyuck intertwines his fingers with Mark's on their way to the dorms, and he sneaks their hands into the pocket of Mark's jacket even though it's the end of summer. Mark has missed him so much that he refuses to let go when their hands start to get sweaty. He is aware that he might be squeezing Donghyuck's hand harder than necessary, but Donghyuck squeezes Mark’s right back, and Mark guesses that has to count for something.

\---

Mark has grown up being humble, that's why he only allows himself to look inside in quiet moments like this.

He's standing in front of the bathroom mirror, a blue towel wrapped tight around his waist as he stares at his reflection. Showers have always made him feel better, warm water running over him and clearing his head as neatly as it cleans his body. Maybe that's the reason why he always looks better in his own eyes when he's covered in tiny droplets of water, his pale skin glistening under the bright light of the bathroom.

The air of the room is charged with condensation because Mark likes his showers hot. The warmth of it has his chest flushed pink, his face a little bit swollen and dotted with small red marks that will be gone after a few minutes, goosebumps growing all over his arms even though it isn't cold. His hair is still wet, sticking out in every direction, and he's bare-faced and unshaved. The gray smudges under his eyes are a lot more accentuated under the white light, his eyes red and hollow-looking. There's short stubble on his chin and upper lip, and a few pimples on his forehead, and one on his left cheek, next to his mole.

Still, Mark feels good.

When he runs his fingers down his neck, the line of his throat is soft under his pads. He presses against his flushed chest just hard enough to leave white fingerprints over his reddened skin, and he runs his hand down across his tummy, sliding over the scattered moles there. He isn't ripped, but he's lightly toned, muscle hard under his palm, not too sharp and not too gentle, his hipbones jutting out almost prettily.

Mark may not have Jaehyun's perfectly smooth face, he may not have Lucas' pretty tan skin, or the hard, defined muscles of Johnny's arms, chest and stomach. Mark's body isn't small and soft like Renjun's, he isn't tall and slim like Jisung, nor is he all gentle like Doyoung. He doesn't have Donghyuck's long, beautiful legs, or his still full cheeks, his heart-shaped lips. He's nothing like the other members, but he's stuck somewhere in between, and he's starting to think that he likes it.

He's still looking at himself in the mirror, the fingers of his right hand slotting between the dips of his ribs, when the door of the bathroom bursts open. Mark almost jumps out of his skin, tearing his gaze away from the mirror and ducking his head so fast that his neck starts to hurt.

"Oh, sorry," Donghyuck's voice comes from behind him. Mark doesn't turn around to look at him, he picks up the towel he had propped on the sink and throws it over his damp hair, covering his face in the process. "I didn't know it was occupied. Why didn't you lock the door, dumbass?"

They don’t share a room anymore, Donghyuck sleeps on the other end of the dorm, it’s not as if Mark was expecting him to barge into this bathroom out of the three they have on this floor. But Mark is not about to say out loud that he doesn’t mind the other members walking in on him half-naked that much, he isn’t about to admit that, out of the people in this house, Donghyuck is the only person with the power to make Mark feel this shy.

"You know Taeyong hyung doesn't want us to," Mark's voice is coming out a little bit ragged, and he wants to blame it on the warmth of the room instead of on the way Donghyuck's presence makes him feel lately, tingling all over and always on guard, waiting for something that never quite comes. "He gets all worried and stuff. You know how he is. _'What if you guys fall in the shower and no one can get in to help?_ ' That kinda thing."

Mark is still scrubbing his hair dry, but the ruffle of the towel can barely muffle the giggle Donghyuck lets out. He doesn't reply though, the bathroom goes so quiet for a moment that Mark is almost sure Donghyuck left without saying anything. But once he hangs the towel around his neck and opens his eyes, he's greeted by Donghyuck staring at him through the mirror.

It is as strong as it is ridiculous, the need to cover himself up. Donghyuck has known him since Mark was all soft baby-fat and untamed long hair and pointy joints, he has seen Mark naked and feverish and even passed out due to exhaustion. Aside from Mark himself, Donghyuck is the one who's experienced every single one of his changes first-hand. Still, Mark's cheeks flush red, and he tugs at the ends of the towel on his shoulders, trying to cover as much of his chest with it as he can.

"You've been working out?" Donghyuck asks as he leans against the doorframe, his eyes running up and down Mark's reflection unashamedly. "You look good."

After all these years, Mark is still trying to figure out if Donghyuck says things like this because he means it, or if it's because he wants to tease Mark. Or maybe he does it because he's always been able to see right through Mark, and he's perfectly aware of the effect some pretty praises have on him. It's always been twice as bad when the words come in Donghyuck's voice, and it makes Mark twice as flustered now that he knows what it is like to have Donghyuck pressing compliments into his lips.

"Hyuck," Mark croaks out, breathless because that's just what Donghyuck does to him.

Mark is hugging himself now, arms tight around his tummy as he looks at Donghyuck through the mirror, his face ducked down in a useless attempt at hiding his obvious blush.

"Oh, sorry," Donghyuck's eyes go exaggeratedly big as he pushes himself off of the doorframe. "You look good, _hyung_ ," he says with faked innocence, round, wide eyes still trained on Mark's wet body, his plush lips pressed together into a pout.

Mark wants to steal Donghyuck's way with words and make him just as flustered. He wants to turn around and kiss him again, just hard enough to make Donghyuck lose his breath. But he doesn't know if he's allowed to, and he isn’t sure enough of his own feelings to ask, either. "That's not-" he says instead, tripping over himself because that's something he's never learned to grow out of. "That's not what I meant-"

"I know," Donghyuck cuts him off, his pout stretching out into one of his sharp smirks. He walks closer, just enough for the front of his shirt to brush against Mark's naked back. "You still look good, though," he whispers into Mark's ear, his eyes never breaking away from Mark's reflection.

Mark thinks he could melt just with this, he could lean against Donghyuck's chest and mold into every single one of his corners. He thinks he could offer Donghyuck everything, even if he's as scared as he's ever been.

Donghyuck is gone as fast as he appeared, though. He pinches Mark's hip hard, his smirk morphing into a full red-cheeked smile, as if his own recklessness is making him shy, too. He's walking out of the bathroom then, and Mark is left all alone, rubbing over the skin of his hip, trying to chase after the feeling.

\---

Sometimes, even with 19 around the corner, Mark still feels 14 years old.

The spotlight has hardened his skin through the years, his survival instinct has soaked in everything the other members could offer him: he's sharpened his dance move, he's improved his diction, he's fastened his rapping, smoothed out his highest notes. Mark has done everything he has to do to not be tossed out of this industry, sucked into a spiral of average artists and forgotten forever. He still has a long way to go, there is always room for improvement, but there is also time left and, for once, Mark can say he's proud of his pace.

Still, some parts of himself feel as brand new and foreign as his entire body felt at 14. Mark has never been good at handling things close to the heart, he's never known how to fill up this void inside of him that's always carved for affection, and he's never quite managed to shrink his pride just enough to be able to ask for attention.

There's this boy, though, loud as thunder and bright as lighting, that keeps clicking perfectly into every single one of Mark's corners. There's this boy who keeps meeting him halfway, even when Mark doesn't call for him. A boy who just _fits_ , so nicely that Mark feels himself overflowing with it, sometimes, scared at someone else getting to know him better than he knows himself.

Mark has never liked anyone before, halfway through 18 and as clueless when it comes to love as his 14-year-old self. Life has always been sound _prettier_ , and pronounce _nicer_ , and spin _better_ , his head so filled up with work, work, work, that Mark hasn't allowed himself to stop and think about how badly his body seems to yearn for Donghyuck. Donghyuck has always been there, after all, reaching out for Mark whenever he needed him most. It's not as if Mark _has_ to yearn for him. But he still does, and he has no idea how to deal with it.

"Feelings are easier to handle when you put music to them," Taeyong is telling him now, ink-stained fingers grabbing at Mark's forearm from across the table in their studio. "Try to grab them and twist them until they rhyme. It's okay if you don't even understand what you're writing at first, getting the words out is the first step to figuring it out."

So Mark does just that, because he's been watching and mimicking Taeyong's work process for as long as he can remember, and he's done just fine so far. He doesn't know a better person to hold his hand and guide him forward.

"Are you writing about someone in particular?" Taeyong asks him after a while, once Mark's fingers are just as covered in blue ink, the sheets of paper in front of him crumpled due to how hard he presses the tip of his pen into the lyrics when he's concentrated. "You haven't stopped scribbling for half an hour, you seem inspired."

Mark purses his lips into a pout as he looks down at his lyrics, fighting the urge to spread his arms over them paper and hide them from Taeyong's eyes. But Taeyong isn't even trying to read them, he knows better than anyone what it means to hide between lines, after all.

"I'm writing about myself, actually," Mark admits, his thumb clicking his pain nonstop. He tried to write about Donghyuck at first, but he needs to figure out his feelings about himself before he even tries to start on his feelings towards someone else. "Like, thinking about how far I've come, you know? Since I joined the company."

Taeyong smiles at him. He always gets this look in his eyes when he's looking at Mark, soft around the corners, his mouth pressed in the smallest smile Mark has ever seen on his face. It feels like Taeyong is staring at Mark now and at a 14-year-old version of him at the same time.

"You've really come far, haven't you?" Taeyong says, bringing a hand up to ruffle Mark's hair (it's brown now, just like it was when he was 14, but shorter and prettier). "You work hard, Mark. You still have a long way to go."

It makes Mark go a little weak at the knees, the unrestrained pride on Taeyong's face. It's not the ugly kind of pride that Mark keeps locked up in his chest, big and rotten and holding back his tongue from asking for help when he needs it. It's the beautiful kind, the kind you feel towards others, the kind that's been meant to be shared.

"It's thanks to you, hyung," Mark tells him, because it's the truth.

Taeyong rolls his eyes at him, his hand sliding down from Mark's hair to tug at his ear. "Don't say dumb things and get back to work, I think we might have a song here," he pats Mark's lyrics with his fingers, his small smile turning into a grin. "If you are ready to share it with the world, that is."

Mark still has trouble letting others take a peek at his insides, years and years under camera lenses have only strengthened his need for privacy at the same time as that his yearning for validation keeps growing and growing. He's kind of a walking contradiction, he thinks as he stares down at his own handwriting, but maybe he can make his feelings sound pretty enough to share them.

They've stopped writing by the time the door to the studio bursts open, and Donghyuck barges in like a hurricane, slamming the door against the wall carelessly.

"You've been locked up in here for _hours_ ," he whines as he walks closer with loud steps. He pushes himself up to sit on the table, right between Mark and Taeyong, the shorts he's wearing riling up his thighs as he dangles his naked legs in the air. "Doyoung sent me to fetch you because it's almost time for dinner."

"Did you have to come in screaming?" Taeyong reprimands him, but there's a fond smile on his face. He looks at Donghyuck almost the same way he looks at Mark, with unabashed affection in the seams of his mouth. "Some people want to _work_ , Heachan."

"I come here to feed you and this is the treatment you give me?" Donghyuck says in fake annoyance. He's playing with his shorts now, twisting his fingers into the ends to pull them up his thighs just to smooth them down again. Mark has to fix his eyes on his lyrics so he won't get too caught up in the golden skin, losing the notion of time as he counts the moles there over and over again.

"You wrote these?" Donghyuck asks all of a sudden, leaning his weight on his elbow to get closer to Mark's papers, his fingers coming to touch down to touch the crumpled notes.

When Donghyuck starts to turn them over the table to be able to read them better, Mark feels the sudden urge to snatch them out of his hands, to press the pages against his chest and hide them from view forever. But if he's going to be baring himself in front of the world, he might as well start with Donghyuck, after all, no one else knows him better.

"These are pretty," Donghycuk mumbles, quiet for the first time since he first walked into the room. "I love the last line," he presses his index finger against it for emphasis, running his pad over the lyrics before he takes his hand off of the notes completely.

"They are good, right?" Taeyong chimes in as he gets up to tidy up his stuff. "Mark's about to become a lyricist star."

Donghyuck jumps off the table with a huff, tugging at the end of his shorts once he's back on his feet. "He already was, though," he says as he walks towards the door. "And hurry up, the food won't wait for you!" And then he's gone.

Mark isn't sure if he likes this new habit Donghyuck has taken, this game where he makes Mark all red and breathless just to disappear right after. Mark is always left struggling all by himself.

He can't take his eyes off his own lyrics, though, a new, gentle kind of pride taking over his body. Mark can't help thinking that his 14-year-old self would probably like it where he is now.

\---

"If you had to date someone from your group, who would it be and why?"

Mark's heard the question a million times—during interviews, in fansigns, even in photoshoots—it shouldn't make him as nervous as it does. He's never taken it seriously, it isn't supposed to be serious after all, they are here to come up with the answer that will entertain fans most, not to be honest. It's rarely about honesty when they are on camera, show too much and you can be stripped down to nothing.

He used to change his answer every single time in the past, say the first name that popped up in his head. But, lately, there's only one name taking up all the space inside of him. So Mark blurts out, "Haechan," honest and direct and with his heart in his throat because he means it.

Dealing with this fact has not been easy, he still gets scared shitless whenever he allows himself to dwell on his feelings. This is partly why Mark hasn't acted on it yet, he doesn't even know _how_ to act around it, what to do with this tingling on his hands whenever Donghyuck gets close to him, but never close enough. It is even worse when they are always surrounded by cameras, surrounded by other members, surrounded by eyes other than their own.

Mark isn't even sure what he wants from Donghyuck, all he knows is that he feels best when he's around, and he wants to feel like that all the time, forever.

What he is sure of, though, is that Donghyuck knows what's going on. Mark can feel it in every small touch, in the way Donghyuck's fingers seem to linger on Mark's body a tad longer than on everyone else’s. He can feel it in the long silences when they are alone—always comfortable, but defining in their lack of noise—as if they are both waiting for something that never happens. He can feel on his lips, whenever Donghyuck's eyes fall there, staring at Mark's mouth with unashamed want written all over his face, as if he's dying to taste him again, but he never dares to do anything about it. The worst part is that Mark doesn’t only want a couple of kisses, he wants _everything_ , but he isn’t even sure what that means.

It is terrifying, wanting so much from your best friend before the scrutinizing eyes of the whole entire world. And Mark may not be brave enough to put their friendship on the line like that (not yet, at least), but he's no coward either, so he repeats, "I'd like to date Haechan," his gaze fixed on Donghyuck's back, sitting right in front of him, all tense shoulders all of a sudden.

"Oh, you sound so sure about it even though you have other 16 guys you could pick," the interviewer laughs, way too high, way too fake, looking at Mark as if he'd like to dissect him. "Why Haechan?"

"Well, he just- He's like, really funny, you know? The mood-maker of our team. You never get bored with him," Mark replies honestly, laughing a little at the end, trying to play it safe. But once he starts talking, it is almost impossible to stop. His mouth tends to spit out truths as easily as breathing, causing him to gift away compliments like candy. That's just what he does. "Man, if you think about it, we've been together for a long time. A _really_ long time," Mark reaches out a hand, his fingers catching Donghyuck's shoulder just to stop himself from biting his nails on live television. "We know each other well, I guess. After- after all this time, right? He brings the best out of me."

That's when he finally stops talking, drawing his lips between his teeth to hold back the embarrassed smile that's threatening to spread all over his face. The interviewer is nodding at him as if his answer is perfectly normal, but Donghyuck has gone almost rigid under Mark's pads, and Jaemin, sitting right next to Mark, is staring at him with his eyebrows raised, his face twisted between an unimpressed and an amused look.

"Well, that was beautiful," the interviewer smiles at him once more before he moves on quickly to the next member. "What about you, Chenle? Do you have someone like that in the group? Who would you date?"

"Nobody," Chenle answers, short and fast and _funny_ in a way that Mark can only wish to be. The mood of the room changes completely, everyone bursts out laughing at his answer, and Mark finally drops his hand off of Donghyuck's shoulder. "I can't stand any of these guys."

The interviewer laughs along with them, and for once he sounds genuine. "Haechan?" he shifts quickly, his words still ringing with amusement.

Mark is starting to feel a bit ridiculous, hands getting damp at the memory of his answer, way too honest for comfort. But then Donghyuck sets his shoulders and says, "I guess I must reciprocate Mark hyung's feelings so he won't look like a loser, right?" and the room bursts into laughter again.

It sounds _mean_ and characteristically charming all at once, just like Donghyuck used to sound when he was a kid and liked to hide compliments between insults. The difference now is that Mark has become an expert at reading between his lines.

"Plus, I've learned a lot from him over the years. I think we do bring out the best in each other," Donghyuck adds, even though he doesn't even have to.

He makes Mark feel _so good_ , he could shake with the force of it.

\---

NCT Dream are family for Mark. That's the easiest, shortest way to put it.

If you asked him to elaborate, Mark would say that Dream are all shared goals, shared growth, a shared _life_. They are awkward first meetings, practice sessions until 3 in the morning, playing games instead of sleeping. They are heart-to-hearts on the kitchen floor, and hurtful words mixed up with laughter so they never really hurt, and hugs so tight that Mark can feel them for days. They are laughing until his ribs ache, until his eyes water, until he can't even breathe. They are knowing and feeling known in the most vulnerable, wholesome way imaginable.

Dream are time, in the best and worst sense of the word. Time wrecking painfully through the seven of them at once, changing and shaping them before each other's eyes, taking them from childhood to adulthood hand-in-hand. Time smoothing them over, tangling them together in a way that seemed limitless even if it never was, making memories so fulfilling that Mark used to forget they've always been running on limited time. They are the lack of time, stealing seconds to their nights just to spend them together while they still can. They've always been Mark's life-long dream (irony is a bitch), they are his most tender years, and also his hardest, most painful ones.

NCT Dream are a wishing coin, the one thing Mark wished for every birthday he celebrated as a trainee, and every single year after. And they made it. Against all odds, they were able to stand on stage together. But the downside to a dream is that you always have to wake up.

They are every single one of Mark's firsts, and they are about to become his first last, too.

Mark stands on stage surrounded by his six best friends for the very last time, and they are all crying for a loss they've always known was coming, a loss that shouldn't even be theirs, that should only feel _Mark's_. But they have always been shared happiness as much as they are shared pain.

It shouldn't even feel like a loss when they are still part of the same group, part of the same company, when they will be seeing each other almost daily, will be crossing paths in practice rooms and dorms and recording studios. But crossing paths isn't nearly enough when Mark is so used to sharing _everything_ with them.

He can't even speak now, can't take all of this and find a way to say it into a mic, morph it into something that will make sense to the crowd before them. All he can do is look up at the lights of the stage and allow himself to cry. He's never cried in front of the boys (he's cried in front of Donghyuck, but Donghyuck doesn't count) but Mark can't even bring himself to be embarrassed about it because, damn, it hurts like hell.

What hurts most, though, is the look on Donghyuck's face when Mark manages to pull himself together long enough to mumble, "Thank you for loving 7Dream."

Donghyuck crumples on the other side of the stage, all slumped shoulders and wet cheeks and trembling hands trying to clean up the mess that he's become. Out of the seven of them, Donghyuck is the one who has the least number of reasons to cry for, the only one who gets to keep performing with everyone after tonight. And still, there he is, not even able to hold Mark's eyes for longer than a counted second before he's bursting into tears one more time.

Mark is feeling a little raw, as if his skin has been ripped off his body and turned over. He's all tangled up inside but softer than ever at the same time. He has the feeling that, if there weren't thousands of people watching them right now, he'd dare to cross the stage and kiss Donghyuck's tears dry.

It is overwhelming, breaking down like this in front of countless strangers. The only way Mark feels like himself again is when he has his seven boys around him, engulfing him in a hug he wishes he could keep forever.

But NCT Dream has always been time for Mark, and they can't stop running out of it.

\---

The floor of the dorms is cold underneath Mark's socked feet as he walks through the hallways as quietly as he can manage, arms wrapped around himself to try to protect his naked skin from the late autumn chill. He should've grabbed a shirt before he decided to get out of his warm, comfortable bed in the middle of the night, but he's been jittery and fidgety since the moment he arrived home after the last NCT Dream show, Donghyuck's tear-stained face filling up all the space in his mind, so overwhelmingly that there is no room left for anything else (he should be getting used to it, Donghyuck being the only thing in his mind, it's been like this for years now).

Mark's fingers are shaking due to the cold and something else when he wraps them around the doorknob to Donghyuck's room. He turns it slowly, tugging the door open and sneaking in as fast as he can. He's holding his breath when he pushes the door closed again, his eyes trying to adjust to the lack of light, searching Jaehyun's bed frantically.

It's not completely dark in the room, the digital clocks placed on the two bedside tables wash the space in a soft, sickly green light, barely there. Mark can see just enough to spot Jaehyun's body, resting on his back with his mouth open, his chest heaving up and down softly, sound asleep.

"Get in here already before you freeze to death," Donghyuck whispers in the quiet of the night, startling Mark so much that he ends up walking backward until his heels knock against the closed door. "Goddammit, Mark. Do you wanna wake Jaehyun up? You're hopeless," Donghyuck is trying to keep his voice down, but it breaks into one of his high-pitched giggles. Mark is so relieved to hear his laughter, crashing messily with the memory of Donghyuck's tears, that he doesn't even have it in him to act offended.

Once Mark finally slips under Donghyuck's covers, it is a bit uncomfortable at first. He isn't used to this. Even though they've shared a bed before, it was usually Donghyuck sneaking into Mark's mattress, hugging him tightly just long enough to bother him, then letting him go to curl into himself on the other end of the bed. But now, lying on his back with Donghyuck only a few centimeters away from him, the need to reach out and cradle Donghyuck's face between his fingers just to make sure he's okay is so strong that Mark has trouble breathing.

"What brings you here, Mark Lee?" Donghyuck asks, shuffling around in bed until he's lying on his side. He's got his right elbow propped up on his pillow, his head resting against his hand so he can look down at Mark properly.

It's really dark in the room, maybe that's why Mark doesn't feel that intimidated by Donghyuck staring down at him, looming over his body as if he wants to take over him (and Mark would let him, he always lets him).

"Nothing," Mark mumbles back, disentangling one of his hands from the bedsheets just to bring it up to Donghyuck's face. He can barely see him, but he can at least trace his features with the tips of his finger to make sure that his cheeks are dry. "Missed you."

Donghyuck's breath catches in his throat audibly, but he doesn't pull back from Mark's touch. "You're freezing. Who the hell sleeps without a shirt in winter?"

 _It's not even winter yet_ , Mark wants to retaliate, just because he can, because fighting Donghyuck is like second nature to him. But his words die under his tongue when Donghyuck nuzzles into the crook of Mark's palm, the hand that isn't cradling his own head coming up to cover Mark’s on his cheek.

"You saw me like three hours ago. Jeez, you're so needy."

Mark doesn't mean to whine at the words, but he can't stop the small noise from crawling up his throat when Donghyuck exposes him like that, so easily, so shamelessly. Mark doesn't even try to deny it, he only presses the pad of his thumb deeper into the soft flesh of Donghyuck's cheek, almost feverish under Mark's cold skin. "Are you okay?" he asks, curling his fingers around Donghyuck's ear, scratching at the sensitive skin there.

Donghyuck stays quiet for a long time, looking down at Mark as if he can see through him even in the darkness of the room. He takes his hand off of Mark's just to slide it down Mark’s arm, his fingers trailing a warm path around the curve of his elbow, raising goosebumps over his freezing skin as he walks his pads slowly to Mark's shoulder. Mark desperately wishes he could see the expression on Donghyuck's face when he presses his thumb to the side of Mark's neck, where his heart is jumping frantically.

"It's the first time I'm gonna stand on stage without you, you know?" Donghyuck whispers down at him, curling his fingers on Mark's naked shoulder until his nails dig into the skin there.

Mark kind of wants to ask him to break through the skin, to scratch him hard enough to leave something behind. It's such a foreign desire, scary and strong and sincere. Mark swallows down the plea and says, "You will be just fine without me."

"I know," Donghyuck huffs at him, and it's too dark to see it, but Mark knows he's rolling his eyes. "But it's gonna be weird. You know what I mean."

Mark wishes he didn't know, but he's been feeling like something's missing since the very second he stepped off the stage. He hasn't even had the time to _miss_ NCT Dream yet, and still, he's already feeling like something vital has been taken away from him.

"You're gonna miss me so much," he smiles instead, scratching the side of Donghyuck's neck with his nails, where he knows he's most ticklish. Donghyuck yelps out loud, almost jumping off the bed as he swats Mark's hand away. "Shhh, you're gonna wake Jaehyun up," Mark mumbles when Donghyuck starts to giggle. "You're soooo hopeless, Hyuck."

Donghyuck slaps Mark's chest then, so hard that the clash of skin against skin echoes in the silent room. "You're so incredibly annoying, Mark," he spits angrily, but he's already crawling back to Mark, throwing one of his legs over Mark's thighs so he can lie flat on top of his naked chest, his nose hidden in the crook of Mark's neck, his favorite place to be when he doesn't feel like existing. "You're so bold for someone who crawled into my bed because he missed me that bad after being apart for three fucking hours."

It's always like this, Donghyuck crawling over Mark, both literally and figuratively. It's been like this for so long that Mark can't really think of himself without thinking of Donghyuck, and it's always been a terrifying thought for someone who hates to bare himself even before their own eyes. But Donghyuck has seen almost every single side of Mark by now, and he's still sticking around, trying to peel more and more layers off of him, trying to reach deeper even when Mark thinks there’s nothing left to offer. Mark is starting to think that he wouldn’t mind giving him everything with his cold, shaky fingers.

"Sing me to sleep?" Donghyuck mumbles against the skin of Mark's neck just in time, as if he can sense Mark getting tangled up in his own scary thoughts (and he probably can).

"You're much better at singing than I am, though," Mark tells him, his chest shaking with laughter against Donghyuck's.

He dares to bring his arms around Donghyuck's frame, placing his damp hands on the small of his back, over his shirt, careful and tentative. He swears Donghyuck _melts_ against him when Mark starts to smooth circles on his hips, his breath hitting Mark's neck in ragged puffs of air with each sweep of his thumbs. It is almost enchanting, the effect that one single gentle caress from Mark can have on Donghyuck. Donghyuck, who is more than used to physical affection, always running around seeking someone to tangle his body with.

"No, shit. Everybody knows that," Donghyuck's lips keep dragging over Mark's pulse point as he speaks, and Mark wants him to place a kiss there so badly. He wants Donghyuck to kiss him all over, wants him to kiss him forever. But Mark is still too scared to cross a line he won't be able to erase in the future, something that will mark them both irremediably, impossible to wash away if they ever regret it. They’ve already teetered over the line once before, but Mark isn’t sure if Donghyuck would like to stand on the other side with him, and stay there. "No one sounds like you, though."

It's such a ridiculous statement, such an obvious thing to say, that it can barely count as a compliment. Still, the words whispered against Mark's sensitive skin, Donghyuck so close to his body that Mark can _feel_ his eyelashes fluttering, it all makes Mark flush red. His body goes tense for all the right reasons, fingers gripping at the back of Donghyuck's shirt just to make sure he's still there and not only in Mark's head.

"Relax," Donghyuck mumbles, and there are hands in Mark's hair, nails scratching his scalp softly. "No one can see us here."

So Mark sings: _I wanna love you in slow motion._

\---

With Dream, Mark learns how to take a joke and how to take a hug. He learns that family is not always linked to blood, and that sweat and laughter and tears can intertwine you with someone just as strongly, or even more. With Dream, Mark learns to make the most out of the time he has, learns to treat every second like his last, and to steal minutes from his nights. He learns to teach and to lead and to _learn_. With Dream, he learns what brotherhood means.

During his time with Dream, Mark learns that patience is not always the best option. He learns to stand up for himself (again), and to fight for the things he wants, even if it means screaming for attention when it still makes him feel small. He learns that letting other people in is scarier than letting yourself in, but he does both anyway, and he hides himself between lyrics. He learns that privacy is something to cling onto with clammy hands, more priced than any music show win, and he learns to share his with those who matter. During his time with Dream, Mark also learns to show, and to touch, and to kiss. He learns that being gentle feels almost natural when he's around Donghyuck, and that Donghyuck melts under his hands just as easily as Mark melts under Donghyuck's.

After Dream, Mark learns that losing is unavoidable, but the knowledge doesn't make it any easier to bear his losses. He learns that, even when you feel like you're standing empty-handed at the end of the world, you can still keep losing. He learns that regretting something that you didn't do is worse than regretting something you did. And he learns to accept that _missing_ is something that can never be learned.


	2. but you got me singing

There are many ugly feelings Mark is used to, but regret has never been one of them.

He's never seen himself as someone brave, but he doesn't consider himself a coward either. Mark was scared when he first auditioned for SM Entertainment, he was scared the first time he joined practice with other members, and also the first time he stood onstage. Mark was scared the first time he got into a plane by himself, he was scared when his dentist told him he would need braces, and also when he had to speak into a mic in a language he didn't fully dominate yet. Mark's been scared many times in his life, but he's never let fear stop him before. Some things just need to be taken slow, but sometimes you don't have any time left to afford.

Mark is learning regret the hard way, leaning against the door frame of Donghyuck's bedroom as Jaehyun fills up a suitcase with Donghyuck's clothes, throwing a bunch of shirts and hoodies and jeans into a messy bundle.

"How long?" Mark asks, following Jaehyun's movements with furrowed eyebrows.

"They can't give us an exact date, an injury like that can be tricky," Jaehyung grunts as he pushes the suitcase closed, fiddling with the zipper. "But it won't be less than two months."

"So he's gonna miss the Japan tour," Mark points out.

"Yes, Mark. He's gonna miss the Japan tour," Jaehyun looks up at him with his eyebrows raised, a small smile on his face that says more than what Mark wants to hear. "Stop frowning, dude. You will survive."

Jaehyun walks closer to pat Mark's shoulder, but Mark moves out of his way. "I know. It just sucks that he has to miss it," Mark clicks his tongue, shaking a hand in the air to play it cool.

It shouldn't matter that much, Donghyuck isn't the first one of them to get injured and miss out on some important performances, that's just part of the industry, part of the life they chose. But Mark is still struggling to come to terms with the fact that he won't be able to stand next to NCT Dream on stage anymore, and now Donghyuck is being taken away from him too, like a cruel butt of a joke.

This time, it is even worse. Donghyuck won't be on stage with him, but he won't be showing up at the studio to drag Mark and Taeyong to dinner in time, he won't be fluttering around practice rooms and singing his lungs out in recording booths. He won't be around at the dorms either, gifting away compliments Mark is still trying to figure out if he deserves, ready to hide in the crook of Mark's neck when no one is watching, melting against him when Mark is feeling brave enough to let go.

"You gotta give me that blue sweatshirt of yours," Jaehyun speaks again. This time, when he clutches Mark's shoulder, Mark is too lost in his own thoughts to move out of his reach. "The one with some orange letters on it? He wants to take it home with him, said it's his favorite."

The words set Mark's cheeks on fire at the same time that they sharpen the feeling of regret. He wishes he had been brave enough to give Donghyuck something else to remember him by, not only a piece of clothing. Something less permanent, but more meaningful.

"Stop sulking, man. He's injured, not dead," Jaehyun chuckles, patting Mark's warm cheek affectionately.

Embarrassment floods Mark's body, sudden and inevitable, causing him to feel ridiculous in a way he hasn't experienced in months. And, this time, Donghyuck isn't even around to make it better. 

\---

Standing on stage without Donghyuck is a little bit heartbreaking. It's not because Mark misses him the same way you would miss something vital (even though he does), it's because Donghyuck has been born to perform.

Donghyuck is the only person who can make Mark stop hating expressions like _natural talent_ and _born with it_ and _meant to shine_ , because he's always been all of that and more. Mark has been a witness of Donghyuck’s progress since day one.

Mark was there, first row and dry-mouthed when Donghyuck started to leave entire rooms speechless with his singing (not even _weeks_ of training under his belt and he stole everybody's breath with his high-pitched, baby-sweet voice). Mark was there when Donghyuck started to make entire TV sets burst into laughter (a million cameras zooming in on his face for the first time and his smile never flattered). He was there when Donghyuck started to dance to hip-hop as elegantly and sharp as he would dance to contemporary choreographies ( _I did ballet when I was a kid_ , he used to say, even though he was still a kid).

The best thing about Donghyuck is that, despite being born for it, he never slacked off. Mark was there, too, when Donghyuck started to wear himself thin, high on the toxic idea that he wasn't good enough. But, in Mark's eyes, he'd always been the best. So Mark was there to witness it, and he was there to stop it.

Now, standing on this stage, under these harsh blinding lights that Mark is still trying to get used to (even after all this time), it feels a little bit cruel that he gets to exist in front of thousands of people while Donghyuck is back in Korea, trapped in his parents' house, unable to even _walk_.

It breaks Mark's heart every time Donghyuck's lines go unsung, or every time any other member covers up for him (their voices are pretty, so, so pretty, but it's not the same). It breaks his heart that all the people attending their shows won't have the chance to witness the force that is Donghyuck first-hand, all his power and danger and beauty.

Mark is having fun, it is impossible not to have fun when you're touring the world with your best friends, when you get to showcase your skills to the world day after day. His hard work is paying off, but he can't share it with the one person who's helped him through it all, and that’s what breaks Mark's heart the most.

Everything is half-empty, half-dimmed, half-done. Mark is always left looking around, turning on his heels, eyes unconsciously searching for something he knows he won't find. There are amused glances and snickering mouths all around him because _he's not dead Mark, don't be that dramatic_. But he can't help it. It's like missing something vital, and he can't bring himself to stop, because you never learn how to miss.

Donghyuck is loud like thunder and bright like lightning, he barged into Mark's life like a storm and turned everything inside out. And now, Mark is losing his damn mind without him, because it's been raining inside of him for a long, long time.

\---

"You're such a loser, Mark," Donghyuck laughs on the other side of the line. "Did you really have to force them to lie on the floor? Seriously?"

Mark is a little embarrassed, he's not gonna lie. Maybe making the entire group create a sun shape on the floor just because he missed Donghyuck wasn't his brightest idea, but he's pretty sure he's hit rock bottom in this tour. He feels like he doesn't have anything else left to hide, his yearning for Donghyuck written clear as a day in every part of his body. It's still scary, but it got Donghyuck to call him, so he will try to wear it proudly.

"I try to do something cute for you and this is how you thank me," Mark frowns back, but he can't even fake annoyance into his tone. His cheeks hurt so much from smiling that he has to bite down on his lips to try to keep a straight face, but he's been buzzing since the second he saw Donghyuck's name flashing on the screen of his phone, as if his body has been lit up from the inside just with a single call. "You were watching, though. You miss us just as much."

"Do the others miss me that badly? Because I've heard it's just a you thing..." Donghyuck teases. He's trying to sound nonchalant, trying to play it cool, but Mark knows him well enough to read between the softness of his tone.

Donghyuck is a confident person. He knows himself better than anyone, knows himself well enough to stand tall and proud in his own body. He knows his limits as well as he knows his strengths. He knows what he's good at and knows how to make the most of it. He knows what he's bad at (almost nothing) and knows how to accept it and conceal it. Mark has always admired this part of him, the comfort he feels under his own skin, the lack of need to hear reassurances from other people's lips because he knows well enough where he stands. He _likes_ where he stands.

But that doesn't mean Donghyuck doesn't like to be admired, praised and appreciated. It's not as visceral as Mark's need for reassurance, though. Some people don't _need_ to be reminded of how good they are to believe it. Some people just want others to acknowledge their worth because it feels good, it feels nice. And Donghyuck makes Mark feels so good, there's nothing Mark wants more than to do the same for him.

So Mark admits in a quiet mumble, "I do miss you so much," because he _knows_ Donghyuck wants to hear it, and because it's true. "Can't wait to see you again."

"You're so dramatic," Donghyuck tells him, but he's giggling at the end, pleased and happy and _there_. "Turns out you are a romantic, Mark Lee. You didn't even have to take me out to prove it."

Mark turns around in bed at the words, burying his warm face into his pillow so Donghyuck won't be able to hear the groan that breaks past his lips. He doesn't know how to deal with all this, the warmth on his thighs whenever he thinks of Donghyuck, the fluttering in his chest when Donghyuck speaks sweet words that shouldn't mean that much (but they do, they always have).

It's all so new to him. Mark is more than used to sweaty palms, but they've always meant nerves, anxiety, embarrassment. He isn't used to wanting someone so bad that his skin literally screams for them. He is living at the edge of a precipice, and he can't wait to free-fall.

"I'm wearing your sweatshirt," Donghyuck says when Mark doesn't reply, because he's never been the one to wait around for an answer, and he always knows where to aim to kill. "Looks better on me."

"Just admit you miss me too," Mark whispers back, his lips dragging over the fabric of the pillow, his heart swelling up in his chest so much that is taking up all the space of his lungs (breathless, always breathless).

Donghyuck only giggles one more time, and says, "You better kiss me again when I'm back."

The line goes dead, and Mark goes boneless.

\---

It takes Mark three days to kiss Donghyuck once he moves back into the dorms.

At first, it feels like Donghyuck isn't even back. He spends more time in the practice room than at home, and when he's home all he talks about is practicing.

"We're touring America soon," he says when Taeyong confronts him about it on the very first day, when Donghyuck tries to sneak out of the dorms to run to the practice room even before he has finished emptying his luggage. "For the first time, hyung! I'm too rusty, have to catch up."

"Be careful, Haechan," Taeyong replies, ruffling Donghyuck's brown hair affectionately, with that look in his eye he always gets when he's with the younger members.

Mark waits up for him that very first night. He snuggles on the couch alone with a blanket wrapped around his body, fingers twisted tightly into the fabric to stop himself from grabbing his phone to call Donghyuck, to stop himself from running out of the dorms after him. But he falls asleep before Donghyuck makes it back.

He waits up for him on the second night too, plopped on his bed this time, the door of his room pushed open so he will hear Donghyuck once he comes into the dorm. Mark ends up falling asleep again, but he wakes up to a warm hand shaking his shoulder. He opens his eyes to ruffled brown hair, flushed cheeks, and a dangerously sharp smile.

"Hey, you. You fell asleep with the light on and the door open," Donghyuck says in a hushed voice. His fingers flying from Mark's shoulder to his hair, brushing a few strands away from Mark's forehead with gentle fingers (he's always so gentle). "You're even wearing a shirt, Mark. In bed. In April. Are you okay?"

Mark is still half-asleep, but he manages to fake a laugh through his dry teeth. "You're so funny, Hyuck," he says, swatting Donghyuck's hand away from his hair only to grab at his wrist with cold fingers, preventing him from moving too far away. "I was waiting for you," Mark admits as he pushes himself to a sitting position.

Donghyuck looks really soft like this, rough with hard work and sleep, his clothes skew and his hair all over the place. But he manages to go even softer at Mark's words, the sharp edges of his smile melting into something sweet.

"Waiting up for me?" he asks, quiet in a way he rarely allows himself to be. He slides his wrists out of Mark's grip only to curl his warm fingers against Mark's cold ones. "Like the nice gentleman you are, hm?"

"You're annoying," Mark grunts, voice rough. Even like this, bleary-eyed with exhaustion, heavy-limbed as sleep clings to every single point of his body, Mark still feels a little breathless at the sight of Donghyuck in front of him, standing there as if he has just walked out of Mark's dreams. "I'm worried about you. You're working too much again," he confesses, his fingers tightening their grip around Donghyuck's hand.

"I'm being careful, I promise," Donghyuck whispers as he leans closer. He's pressing a kiss to Mark's cheek then, soft and fast and barely-there. If Mark wasn't so sleepy, he would probably cling to Donghyuck's shoulders and ask him to stay, ask him to kiss him all over. But Donghyuck pulls away in the blink of an eye, his fingers slipping out of Mark's as he mumbles, "Sleep well, hyung," all quiet and calm and all the tame adjectives that don't really fit him.

Mark sleeps well because he dreams of him, but he will never admit it out loud.

On the third day, Mark goes to the practice room after Donghyuck.

It's not pretty, feeling needy and desperate. Mark's always been needy, but not in a _loud_ way. He's always liked to keep his needs to himself, too prideful to ask out loud for the stuff he wants until he's so on edge that he ends up overflowing. He's always overflowing when it comes to Donghyuck, and he's been waiting for far too long (he's had his eyes open for a few months, but he's pretty sure it's been years).

So Mark shows up in the practice room, needy and desperate and embarrassed, but he still shows up. And Donghyuck _beams_ at him when he sees him.

"Missed me too much already?" he jokes from where he's sitting on the floor, that wicked smirk of his drawn prettily on his face.

Donghyuck is resting against the mirror wall, his knees bent and his forearms resting over his thighs. He's got his head pushed back, his brown hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, and his cheeks are swollen and red with exhaustion, causing his face to look rounder than usual. He looks just like he did when he was a kid, when he used to stick around to make sure Mark didn't go over his limit, even if he complained all the way through and never dared to admit it out loud.

They've come such a long way, Mark realizes as he admits out loud, "I'm just worried about you. I don't want you to get hurt again."

"You are just scared I'm gonna leave you all alone and pining one more time," Donghyuck chuckles as he pushes himself to his feet. He can joke around with stuff like this so easily, so naturally, and Mark is always melting down, all burning cheeks and sweaty palms and bitten lips. "I promise I'm being careful, I'm not dumb."

"Never said you were," Mark says, drawing his bottom lip between his teeth as he watches Donghyuck approach.

He's changed so much, his body is nothing like the little kid he was when they first met. Donghyuck is all long legs and pretty curves and elegant lines, smooth skin that twinkles golden under the lights of the practice room. His body changed before Mark's eyes so seamlessly that Mark barely realized. Now, his hands twitch with the need to reach out and glide his pads all over Donghyuck's skin, curl his fingers into every knot, press his palms to every bump and dip and corner.

Mark feels needy in such a new, violent way, he feels scared and embarrassed all over. But the way Donghyuck's eyes are running over Mark's body as he walks closer tells him he's not the only one.

"You can stick around," Donghyuck says, coming to a stop right in front of Mark. He's looking at him with his head tilted to the side, the line of his throat glistening with sweat. "I need help with some of the moves."

So Mark sticks around, and helps as much as his new needy self allows him to. He can barely focus, he feels electrified the entire time, touch-starved in a way he's never felt before because his body has never yearned for physical affection until now. Donghyuck has changed him in so many ways throughout the years, and he kept changing him while being gone. Sometimes, Mark still gets paralyzed by the fact, but now he's gotten brave enough to push forward anyway.

"C'mere," Mark says when Donghyuck finally decides that it's time to stop, both soaked with sweat and the clock hitting 3 in the morning.

He walks towards Donghyuck, twists his fingers into the elastic of his sweatpants, and tugs him closer in a hard pull. Donghyuck raises his eyebrows at him, his lips wrapped around the mouth of a plastic bottle, water sliding down his chin at Mark's roughness.

"Easy, tiger," Donghyuck giggles when he pulls the bottle away, but he doesn't break free from Mark's grip. "Desperate much?" he crooks an eyebrow at Mark, throwing the water bottle behind him even though it's still open. He doesn't seem to care about the water splashing all over the parquet floor of the practice room, his dark eyes focused on Mark's face.

When Donghyuck brings his right arm up to clean up the water that dribbled down his chin, Mark grabs his wrist before he can get to it. He leans in, sticking his tongue between his parted lips to mouth at Donghyuck's chin, licking the water off of his skin, too wound up to feel any ounce of embarrassment.

Donghyuck tastes salty under Mark's tongue, a mix of sweat and skin and something else, so intoxicating that it has Mark groaning in the back of his throat. Mark swears he can feel Donghyuck's pulse picking up under his thumb, his arm going limp in Mark's grip with shock. He stays very still as Mark licks his way up his chin to the seam of his lips, so, so still that he might have stopped breathing alltogether.

"Will you let me kiss you now?" Mark whispers against the corner of Donghyuck's mouth, his nose digging into the softness of Donghyuck's flushed cheek. "I've been trying since you got back, just like you told me."

Mark has no idea where all his confidence is coming from, he doesn't really know what he's doing, or where this is going. He hasn't even kissed anyone since he gifted his first kiss to an angry Donghyuck in a dark fitting room. But he is so filled up with repressed want and neglected need that there is no room left in his body to feel anything else.

Donghyuck _whines_ at his words, breaking free from Mark's grip on his wrist just to push his fingers through Mark's hair. "Please," he says in the heat between them, twisting his hands into Mark's strands hard enough to hurt, pushing their bodies closer as if he can't help himself, as if he's just as needy as Mark (as if he's been burning up for longer). "I've been waiting."

And who's Mark to deny him anything?

Their lips crash together messily, already open-mouthed in their eagerness and impatience, teeth clashing clumsily with inexperience. Still, they make it work (they always make it work).

Mark brings his hands to Donghyuck's feverish neck, presses his fingers behind his ear and thumbs at his chin to tilt his head to the side. He slows down the kiss, taking his time to slot their open mouths together properly, sneaking his tongue past Donghyuck's lips as soon as they click like puzzle pieces.

He licks at the inside of Donghyuck's cheeks, behind his teeth, tilts his head more to tongue at the roof of his mouth greedily. And Donghyuck goes so pliant against Mark, eyes closed and mouth open, tame under Mark's fingers to let him take over him as he pleases, as if he'd allow Mark to ruin him if he ever wanted to. His hands are clutching at Mark's shoulders hard, though, as if his entire body has gone so damn soft that he needs the support to stay up. It's still difficult to digest, the fact that Mark has enough effect on Donghyuck to make him go this docile.

"God, Hyuck," Mark groans into Donghyuck's mouth, pulling away just far enough to breathe. "You make me lose my mind," he confesses right before he's leaning in again, already addicted to the warmth of Donghyuck's mouth.

This time is even better because Donghyuck's tongue meets him halfway. It's as if he's been woken up from a trance, his arms sliding around Mark's neck to pull him even closer, until their chests and hips are perfectly lined against each other. Donghyuck curls his fingers at the nape of Mark's neck, tugging at the hair there to tilt his head backward, and he swallows the whine that crawls up Mark's throat eagerly, thirstily, nibbling at his bottom lip before he's pulling away one more time.

"Shit," Donghyuck laughs against Mark, pushing their foreheads together, their breath tangling in hot, fast pats. "We could've been doing this for _months_ if you weren't such an overthinker," his lips brush against Mark's as he speaks, and Mark can't help himself, he's leaning in again to peck him once, twice, thrice, just because he can.

"I'm sorry," he whispers with one last firm kiss to Donghyuck's plump lips. When he pulls away enough to look at Donghyuck's face properly, he's mesmerized by the view, all red cheeks and red lips and a smile so tender that Mark thinks he might be dreaming. "We can keep doing this forever now, if you want."

Donghyuck laughs at him, his eyes squinted and his nose scrunching up cutely. Mark has to swallow the need to lean down again and kiss the tip of his nose, this time.

"Don't apologize, dumbass," Donghyuck scolds him, gripping at Mark's shoulders to disentangle their bodies. "It's perfect like this. More than perfect."

Mark only lets him go because he's too busy trying to stop himself from melting right there. It's a bit ironic, how a couple of words can disarm him just as fast as a couple of kisses, how an offhand comment that can't even be considered a compliment can fill him up to the brim with pure bliss.

As Donghyuck gets to work, cleaning up the wet floor, Mark can only stand there, lips pressed tight together to stop himself from smiling like a fool.

\---

"Can this count as me taking you out?" Mark asks as he shuffles around in the backseat of the van, his head bumping against the glass of the closed window.

He's got his eyes focused on the view, the beautiful Arboretum getting further and further away as they drive back to their hotel in Dallas. Aside from their driver, Donghyuck and Mark are alone in the van, sitting on opposite sides of the backseat, the middle seat covered by their backpacks and jackets. It's peaceful like this, quiet in a way their lives rarely are, almost private in the silence of the afternoon.

"It wasn't even your idea, Mark," Donghyuck chuckles lightly.

Mark tears his gaze away from the trees to stare at him. Donghyuck's hair is silver now, ruffled and tangled up due to the wind that accompanied them the entire day, and he's got his head pushed back, eyes closed and his face relaxed in sleepy lines. There are no traces of that threatening smile Mark knows so well, nor remnants of Donghyuck's famous persona. He looks peaceful, the golden light of the afternoon sun washing his profile, making him glow the way he's been born to.

"But we saw squirrels and pretty flowers, dude. We rode the tram, that was cute... Felt like a date to me," Mark tells him. He keeps running his eyes through Donghyuck's features as his fingers play with the strap of his backpack, just so he won't be tempted to reach across the backseat to press his fingers to the gold-lit skin of Donghyuck's cheeks. "I even paid for the food!"

Donghyuck scoffs, his eyes snapping open just so he can glare at Mark. A few months ago, Mark's ears would probably go deep red and he'd break the eye contact in a second, he'd turn his head as fast as possible and pretend he'd been looking out the window all this time. Right now, his ears still get all warm, but he smiles at Donghyuck, small and private in their shared solitude, and raises his eyebrows at him determined to look into his eyes for more than three counted seconds.

"You only paid because you lost a game, you didn't even _offer_ ," Donghyuck leans a bit closer, his elbow resting on top of the bundle of clothes resting on the middle seat as his fingers twist into the strap of his seatbelt. "And you're still calling me 'dude'."

"I'll stop calling you 'dude' when you start calling me 'hyung'," Mark bites back, still smiling as he leans across the backseat as well. And he's nervous, sweaty hands and pounding temples, (because this is Donghyuck, and he always sends Mark's heart into overdrive), but he stands his ground, sliding this tongue between his teeth as his eyes bore into Donghyuck's.

Donghyuck looks so pretty when he blushes, soft pink spreading from the tip of his nose to his full cheeks, so perfectly painted over his tan skin that it seems almost artificial. He huffs at Mark, pulling back against this seat abruptly and crossing his arms over his chest as a defense mechanism that Mark knows far too well now. Mark can't help the giggle that bubbles up his chest, proud and giddy, and it only gets louder when Donghyuck rolls his eyes at him, his eyes sliding to the window.

"But you had fun, right?" Mark asks after a few seconds in silence, his now sweaty fingers still playing with the strap of his backpack.

"If you want me to tell you this was the best first date ever, I will," Donghyuck looks at him again, an unimpressed eyebrow crooked up, smiling smugly as if he can read right through Mark (because he can). "It's not as if I have anything to compare it to, anyway."

There is something very sweet in being each other's first everything, something powerful and secret and so, so intimate that it always turns Mark into a jittery mess. What he's sharing with Donghyuck is something that he won't have the chance to share with anyone else in the future, and he can't think of anyone better to do all this with (he's never been able to think of anyone else this way, period). But it is also kinda bittersweet, always surrounded by cameras and prying eyes, having to steal seconds from their busy schedules, walking together under the spotlight but not being able to walk together under the sunlight.

"I'm sorry. I wish I could take you out for real, you know?" Mark mumbles, his eyes finally drawing away from Donghyuck to look at the backrest of the empty seat in front of him. "And, like, I know you have no experience with all this either. So, I'm sorry that I can't give you what you deserve, I guess?" he frowns at the cushion in front of him, letting go of the strap of his backpack to rub at his nape, suddenly going all warm and tingly as he willingly bares himself in front of someone else. "I don't know when I'm going to be able to give you a proper date. It's kinda- It's really frustrating, but-"

"You don't have to, Mark," Donghyuck breaks in, successfully cutting off his rambling. When Mark finally looks back at him, Donghyuck is smiling, but it's not one of his threatening smirks, it's the kind he only shows Mark in unguarded moments. "You deserve a proper date just as much as I do, you know?" Donghyuck says, his fingers playing with the strap of his seatbelt nonstop. "But I don't _need_ any of that. You don't have to do any of that."

"I know I don't have to," Mark confesses cautiously. "But I want to."

Donghyuck transforms right before Mark's eyes: the soft corners of his mouth twist up in a dangerous crook, his eyebrows curl up sharply, and his eyes roll back mockingly. "Such a poster boy, aren't you?" he huffs, glancing at Mark with that unimpressed stare that looks too nonchalant to be real. "You wanna be the best boyfriend, right?" he giggles, his laughter getting higher and ragged at the end when Mark flushes at the word. "Your obsession to do everything perfectly or not doing it at all... It's the leo in you, I think," he clicks his tongue, shaking his head at Mark.

"You don't know shit about Astrology, Hyuck," Mark glares at him. "So don't patronize me."

"But I know _you,_ dumbass," Donghyuck says, leaning closer one more time. "And I don't need you to impress me with dates or whatever," he whispers, putting a hand around his mouth as if he's sharing a secret. "I already know you are the best for me, hyung."

And he's teasing, speaking in a sickeningly sweet voice, his lips spreading into a shit-eating grin when the honorific rolls off of his tongue too gently to be genuine. Donghyuck is fully aware of the power he has over Mark, knows exactly the buttons he has to press to send him into a sugar rush. Still, Mark can't help the way his entire body heats up at the words, because he also knows Donghyuck all too well, can read between every single one of his teasing sentences and exaggeratedly sweet jokes to grab at the truths hidden between it all.

Mark wants to kiss him so badly, he has to reach forward and dig his fingers into the backrest of the seat in front of him to hold himself back. Once they are back in their hotel, though, it is Donghyuck the one who ends up pressing Mark against the closed door of their shared room and kissing his lips numb.

\---

Mark looks at himself in the mirror, running his hands down the glossy black tracksuit the stylists have stuffed him in, his fingers stopping to fidget with the zippers over his ribs. He feels a bit ridiculous like this, with all these unnecessary zippers all over his clothes, too many thick necklaces around his neck, and almost all of his fingers circled by heavy rings. At least his hair looks decent, he thinks as he touches the dirty blond strands, gelled to the side to show his forehead.

That's how Donghyuck finds him when he opens the door of the dressing room, looking all comfortable and effortlessly pretty in Adidas sweatpants and one of Mark's shirts under a black coat. Mark feels suddenly overdressed, a ridiculous feeling when he's in the middle of a shooting, but one he can't control.

"What are you doing here?" Mark turns around to face Donghyuck, giving his back to the mirror. "Did you sneak in to bump into Taemin hyung? Sorry to tell you he's not shooting today."

"Ha, ha, ha," Donghyuck rolls his eyes at him, locking the door behind him and walking deeper into the white room, a plastic bag hanging from his left arm. "I brought you breakfast and you're already being a pain in the ass." Mark follows him with his eyes as Donghyuck walks around the small dressing room. He takes off his coat and hangs it on the back of the makeup chair, placing the plastic bag on top of the long table. "I feel like I haven't seen you in years," he says once that his hands are free, turning around to face Mark again.

"Dude, we started shooting this week," Mark raises an eyebrow at him, reaching out to grab Donghyuck's wrist and pull him closer. "Missing me already?"

Donghyuck frowns at him but he doesn't fight the words. "You're barely at the dorms since the whole SuperM thing started," he mumbles, hands flying up to fidget with the zippers on Mark's ribs, tugging them open and closed again. He's got his lips pursed in a cute pout, so Mark leans in to kiss it away, just because he can.

"You're always messing with me, but you're so needy," Mark whispers against Donghyuck's mouth, his own fingers coming up to rest on Donghyuck's hips.

"You know, I only came here to bump into Taemin, but this project can't even give me that," Donghyuck sighs dramatically, pulling back. "What even is this?" he says with a giggle as he tugs at Mark's zippers one more time.

"It's weird, right?" Mark turns around to look at himself in the mirror one more time, his fingers reaching down to trace over the zippers around his thighs this time. "I feel like a trash bag, man. And the hyungs look so cool."

Donghyuck stares at him through the reflection, one of his eyebrows crooking up as he walks close enough for his chest to bump against Mark's. "You're nervous, aren't you?"

Mark draws his bottom lip between his teeth tilting his head to the side as he stares at the two of them. They look good together, even when Donghyuck is clad in comfortable loose clothing and Mark is all done up for work. Even when Donghyuck is bare-faced, hair all soap-soft and messy, and Mark's face is perfected by make-up, hair perfectly styled. And here Mark is, feeling odd and out of place when he's the one ready for showtime.

"They are big names, you know?" he says under his breath, deflating and leaning back against Donghyuck's back. Sometimes, you just need someone else to help you carry your own weight for a little bit, and Mark is desperate to learn how to share the burden. Donghyuck's proved time and time again that he's more than willing to hold them both when Mark's a bit drained, so he might as well start here. "I'm not sure if I... I don't know if I'm gonna do well. If I'm gonna be able to keep up with them. God, that sounds so wrong," Mark scrunches up his nose, his words breaking into a giggle at the end. "Well, at least I've got Taeyong hyung."

Donghyuck stays quiet for a while. Mark sees him get on his tip-toes through the full-body mirror just so he can hook his chin on Mark's shoulder, hands sliding around Mark's chest to fiddle with the zippers again. It's such an innocent gesture, but it still gets Mark all worked up, his hands and nape growing hot and sweaty at the feeling of Donghyuck's thighs pressed up against his.

It's still kinda new, this intimacy between them. It's still unnatural for Mark to let himself get carried away like this, melting under Donghyuck's hands, dropping all his guards to allow Donghycuk to curl around him like ivy, sneaking under Mark's skin as he pleases. But it feels so right at the same time. Maybe Mark hasn't been born to be on stage, but he's sure he's been born to be right here, in the circle of Donghyuck's arms.

"You don't need him, you know?" Donghyuck mumbles into his ear, his eyes looking right into Mark's through the mirror. "Taeyong hyung, I mean. You don't really need him. You did just fine leading dream, and he wasn't there to help you, that was all you."

"Yeah, but that's not the same," Mark tilts his head, resting his temple on Donghyuck's hair. "I was with you guys."

"Yeah, but you didn't even know us at first. And we were a pain in the ass," Donghyuck smiles, his face lighting up at the memories.

"You still are, though," Mark tells him, huffing when Donghyuck kneels him on the back of his thigh.

"The point is, yeah, it is nice that you've got Taeyong hyung, but you don't really need him to do a good job," Donghyuck keeps going, his face turning serious one more time. "Just like I don't really _need_ you with Dream. We're good enough on our own."

The need to retaliate is heavy on Mark's tongue, demanding him to fight back, to point out that he's never been half as good as Donghyuck. But he manages to swallow it down because, even if he's never felt half as good, he's always worked just as hard, and that has to count for something.

Donghyuck uncurls himself from Mark's body when he doesn't get a reply. He digs his fingers into Mark's hips just to turn him around, his fingers crawling up Mark's chest slowly once they are facing each other.

"Plus," the tip of his tongue peeks from between his teeth as he looks up at Mark through his eyelashes, head tilted down. "You look fucking sexy like this," Donghyuck whispers, curling one of Mark's thick necklaces around his index fingers.

"Oh, do I?" Mark asks in a breathless mumble, his heart picking up speed at Donghyuck's hushed compliment, ready to climb up his throat and break free. "'Cause I truly feel like a trash bag, kinda ridiculous."

"I think you're just trying to fish for compliments," Donghyuck smirks at him, that twisted curl to his mouth that's been raising goosebumps all over Mark's skin since he was 14. "I can see right through you Mark Lee," he says, tilting his head up to brush his nose along Mark's (and Mark thinks: _I know, I know_ ). "You like it, right? When I tell you how pretty you look?"

Donghyuck pulls back a tad to stare at Mark with wide, wide eyes, eyebrows raised high on his forehead as if he's waiting for an answer. But Mark is lost, breathless and speechless and trapped in this storm called Donghyuck, fingers clawing at the fabric of Donghyuck's shirt (Mark's shirt) as his knees go boneless.

A desperate whine rips through Mark's throat as he pushes forward, his lips trapping Donghyuck's, already open-mouthed, drinking him up desperately. He can't even feel embarrassed as he kisses Donghyuck like this—fast and messy and oh-so-deep—because Donghyuck is just as eager, sinking his fingers into Mark's nape as if he's trying to stop himself from tugging at Mark's perfect-gelled hair.

"Pretty boy," Donghyuck keeps whispering into Mark's swollen lips, getting his heart racing so fast that Mark believes he's about to burst open. "My pretty boy."

And, damn yes, Mark has been born for this.

\---

"Why do you think you debuted so many times, Mark?" the interviewer asks, smiling so widely and sweetly that it seems almost fake.

Mark has been hearing this question for years now, so the answer rolls off of his tongue as naturally as breathing. "I guess I just fitted in all the groups, you know? No special reason."

"We're with your hyungs this time, though," the interviewer presses. "Surrounded by artists like Taemin or Baekhyun, don't you ever stop to think what's so good about you that took you here?"

Mark can't help but frown at the question, his fingers tightening around the mic as he bites onto his lower lip, eyes sliding off to his right to look at Lucas, sitting right beside him. He's struggling to find an answer, trapped in his head as he wonders time and time again why these questions are always aimed at him when there are people around him who have come just as far as he has.

"Mark is very humble, but I think he's come this far because he's good at everything," Taeyong chimes in, and Mark has to duck his head away from the cameras to try to hide the sudden heat that crawls from his chest to his cheeks. "He's a good rapper, a good dancer, a good singer," Taeyong starts to list off with his fingers, "a good performer overall... He's naturally funny, an entertainer, and has been writing amazing lyrics since he was a kid. He's got everything, he's meant to be onstage."

And the words are so sweet, dripping fondness and pride all over the TV set, that they get Mark's heart racing. He can't help the pleased giggle that sneaks past his lips, a hand coming up to try to hide his flushed face from the cameras.

"Um, wow. Thanks, hyung. I just- I work hard every day," he shrugs in the end, still smiling so much that his cheeks hurt a little. He stretches out his free hand to curl his fingers around Lucas' shoulder, giving it a hard squeeze. "People like me and Lucas who are still so young, we just work hard and try to keep up, yeah," he laughs into the mic, nodding when the interviewer seems satisfied with the answer.

Mark is still in a good mood when he gets back to the dorms, even though it's past midnight and every single part of his body aches, limbs heavy with exhaustion. The day only gets better when he walks into his room to find Donghyuck curled up between Mark's blankets, still awake but with his eyes all droopy and glossy.

"Hey you," he says when Mark approaches to sit on the edge of the bed, his fingers immediately flying to Donghyuck's messy hair. "Got home just in time," Donghyuck whispers quietly (he goes quiet around Mark so often lately).

"Yeah?" Mark asks him, playing with the strands of Donghyuck's hair. He takes his time to take him in, the soft cheek squished against Mark's pillow, the bright eyes shining between his half-closed lids, the gentle curve to his soft lips when Mark slides his pads down the side of his neck. Everything about him so peaceful, incredibly soft under Mark's thumb. "Were you about to fall asleep?"

"Mhm," Donghyuck nods lightly, taking one of his hands from under the blanket to push Mark's hand away. "Go change and get in bed before I pass out, hurry up."

Mark does as he's told, and the day (even though the clock marks it's already over) gets only better when he finally slides into bed.

Donghyuck curls around him like ivy, pushing his warm nose into the skin of Mark's neck, and he whispers, "You did well today, you've worked hard."

And Taeyong's words are still ringing into Mark's ears, honest and pure and precious. But there is something more powerful about having your hard work acknowledged over your natural talent, and Donghyuck knows the difference just as well as he knows Mark.

So Mark presses a wide smile against Donghyuck's hair and allows himself to whisper back, "Thank you."

\---

"I said a minor, Hyuck," Mark sighs for what feels like the fifth time, leaning closer in bed to look at Donghyuck's fingers better. "That's an e major, dude."

Donghyuck glares at him when the last word leaves Mark's lips, but Mark only stares back with his eyebrows raised, pleased at the reaction it always gets out of Donghyuck after years and years fighting to hear a _hyung_ in Donghyuck's voice.

"I can't remember what an a minor is, I think this was a bad idea," Donghycuk clicks his tongue, relaxing his grip around the neck of the guitar to rest the instrument flat across his thighs. "Seriously, we've been at it for hours, my fingers hurt."

"We started like half an hour ago, you just love to complain," Mark rolls his eyes at him, but he can't fight the fond smile that decides to settle on his lips. He takes Donghyuck's hand and rests it on his lap, over his crossed legs, and his smile only widens when his calloused fingertips press against Donghyuck's soft pads. "You're so dramatic, your fingers are barely red."

"Well, maybe I don't wanna end up having scouring sponges as fingers like you," Donghyuck bites as he takes his hand out of Mark's grip, crossing his arms and puffing his chest out. He still goes from mellow to ready-for-war in the blink of an eye, no matter how much time goes by.

At 14 years old, Mark would've found himself staring at his own hands, digging his clapped nails into the hard pads of his fingers, wondering if the slide of his hands across someone else's skin is even pleasant. At 14 years old, Mark would've frowned and scoffed, straightening his back just to feel bigger than Donghyuck, the gears of his brain turning and turning trying to find the sharpest words to bite back with.

Now, at 20 years old, Mark giggles under his breath. "It was your idea, though," he says, his voice all light and soft and disgustingly sweet, sounding just like Donghyuck always makes him feel. "Are you sure you wanna give up that easily? I thought you were tougher than that."

"You're so fucking annoying, Mark Lee. Did you know that?" Donghyuck frowns back at his guitar, but he's already curling his fingers around its neck one more time, bringing the instrument closer to his chest. "Maybe you're just a shit teacher."

"You go ask someone else to teach you, then" Mark retaliates.

Donghyuck's frown deepens, but when Mark leans his body a tad closer to adjust Donghyuck's fingers over the right strings, Donghyuck lets him. "I have no one else to ask," he mumbles between his pursed lips.

It's a lie, Mark knows it well. He could've asked Taeil, who's only a few rooms away, with nothing better to do than to browse Netflix all day. Donghyuck could've also gone out of his way and walk to WayV's dorm, look for Ten and ask him instead, who is just as skilled as Mark. But Donghyuck is still here, sitting cross-legged on Mark's mattress, allowing Mark to guide him and press his fingers gently.

"See? A minor is what you were doing before, but a string lower," Mark points out. He's lost count of the number of times he's tried to teach Donghyuck only a couple of chords in the last half an hour, but after everything Donghyuck has taught Mark over the years, patience is the least he can offer him. "There you go. Play now, you're doing so well."

Donghyuck slides the thumb of his right hand over the strings, filling up the room with one single, clean note. His head snaps towards Mark, eyes all big and shiny, his mouth partly open as he does it one more time, with more confidence this time.

"Yeah, that's right!" Mark leans back a little to clap excitedly, a high-pitched laugh bubbling in his chest when Donghyuck keeps staring at him almost wide-eyed. "See? You can totally do it, that's so nice, wow."

"It's just, like, one single note, Mark," Donghyuck rolls his eyes, but there's this light pink dusting his cheeks, and the seams of his lips are slightly curled upwards as if he's trying to stop himself from beaming at Mark.

"Still, dude! It's difficult to achieve clean notes when you just started playing, seriously," Mark tells him, his left hand flying to Donghyuck's knee to squeeze approvingly. "C'mon, keep going."

So Donghyuck keeps going. He drags his fingers over the strings rather clumsily, switching between the only three chords he can remember, building up a simple-soft melody by imitating what he's so, so used to seeing Mark do.

It's nothing complicated, just a pattern of five notes that break messily at the end before Donghyuck starts playing the same thing all over again. It's a bit jarring and definitely not as clean as that first note he achieved, but it lits up a lightbulb inside of Mark's brain. Suddenly, he's scrambling off the bed to rummage through his desk with itchy fingers, desperate to grab onto some pen and paper.

"What's gotten into you?" Donghyuck asks, stopping the music abruptly by pressing his palm flat against the strings.

"Hold on. I just- I think I got an idea," Mark finally snatches a small notebook and a random pen from his desk and runs towards the bed again, jumping into the mattress with more energy than necessary, causing Donghyuck to bounce a little. "Can you do that again? I mean, the melody you had... Can you remember?"

Donghyuck is staring at him with a crooked eyebrow, his lips pressed tight together as he seems to be evaluating Mark. For a second, Mark believes Donghyuck is gonna complain about his sore fingertips again, but his eyes slide down to the notebook on Mark's hand and he snaps, "Of course I remember, who do you think I am?" and starts strumming the strings one more time.

At first, no coherent words come to Mark's mind. He starts to hum softly, his voice shifting to a falsetto because that's what he's most confident in when he doesn't have direct guidance from a producer, his vocal cords a bit rusty after having ditched singing for rapping for so many years now.

"Don't do that," Donghyuck stops the music one more time, slapping his palm over the six strings. "Sing louder."

Mark tilts his head at him, his eyes growing bigger in confusion. "I don't even have lyrics, I'm just, like, messing around and stuff."

"I know," Donghyuck sighs exasperatedly. He places his pads over the right strings again, but he doesn't start playing just yet, his eyes fixed on Mark the way he always does when he's seeing right through him. "But you always do that, sing all high because you aren't confident or whatever. Just, sing with your voice, Mark. It's pretty."

God, it's so fucking ridiculous how easily those two simple words get to Mark. Even after all these years shared with Donghyuck, even after having Donghyuck whimpering and moaning into his mouth, it is always the simple compliments that get to Mark most—just offhand comments that don't seem to mean much, afterthoughts that slip out of Donghyuck's mouth like something trivial because he truly means them. Mark can't help it, he giggles one more time, his lower lip trapped between his teeth as he flushes like a schoolboy trying to talk to his first crush (and, in a way, that's what he is, because there's never been anyone else).

"Oh my god, don't go all mushy on me now," Donghyuck scrunched up his nose, uncrossing his legs for a second to kick at Mark's shin lightly, but he's blushing just as much as Mark himself. "Just sing."

So Mark does as he's told, even if he's just mumbling and throwing random words to the beat of the music at first. He still gets embarrassed at the sound of his own voice, frowning and cringing a little every time it doesn't seem to sound as clean and lovely as he'd wish it to. But he keeps going until coherent sentences finally pop up in his head, Donghyuck throwing in some ideas here and there, joining him in a perfect harmony that makes Mark's singing sound better (he's always managed to make Mark better).

Lyrics ends up flowing from Mark's pen easily, his handwriting filling the blank pages faster than any time he's composed a song alone. It's a new kind of intimacy, sharing the writing process with someone else like this. Even if it's been a long time since the moment Mark made peace with the fact that countless strangers are listening to his thoughts turned into songs, sharing a refined, edited version of a raw song is not the same as allowing someone else to peek into the creating process. This means peeling yourself open to display all the tries and failures, all the unfiltered thoughts and intimate feelings. It's like learning how to write all over again, and Mark kind of loves it.

Mark's voice dies by the time Taeil walks into the room, curious after hearing the same melody through the walls for two hours now. He sits down on the mattress next to Donghyuck and asks them to play the song for him. So Mark trades the notebook for the guitar and plays the simple melody to Donghyuck's clean, lovely voice. Donghyuck glares at him when he joins in half-hearted harmonies, but he doesn't say anything about it.

They only play the first verse, because that's all they've written so far, but Taeil claps as if they've composed a whole album, already asking them to teach him the lyrics once the song is complete.

Once they are alone together one more time, Donghyuck keeps frowning at Mark. But Mark trades the guitar for the notebook and writes: _I can try tomorrow, if I do it together with you._

\---

They don't get many slow, private days lately.

Mark feels a bit split in two, running from practice rooms with SuperM into practice rooms with NCT 127, preparing two tours at once while feeling like two different people. He knows he can do it, he's done it before with Dream, but he can barely remember how he managed to jump from one skin into another without ripping something in the process.

It shouldn't feel so dangerous, he's still the same person after all, but each group demands something different from him, and the exhaustion curling into every single one of his joints makes it all seem a lot harder.

Mark appreciates rare quiet mornings the most, scarce moments where he gets to lie shirtless on his bed, feeling relaxed and almost like himself again as his body melts into the soft fabric of the sheets, the cold autumn breeze that sneaks into the room through the open window washing over him, piercing his skin just enough to make him feel a bit whole.

Quiet mornings are even better when he gets to share them with Donghyuck.

As much as Mark enjoys keeping their relationship only _theirs_ —hidden kisses in backstage corners, biting Donghyuck's lips purple in locked bathroom stalls, sliding his hands over Donghyuck's soft curves under tables, staring at him through crowded rooms in glances that hide a lot more than everyone around them can imagine—nothing compares to being able to touch Donghyuck unrushedly, with a gentleness Mark is still surprised he can posses.

Some day, Mark thinks (hopes), he will be able to appreciate Donghyuck out in the open. For now, he's happy making the most out of the time he has.

He turns around in bed now, lies on his side to bring his fingers to the side of Donghyuck's neck, poking one of the moles there with a tender finger. He's traced over the little dots countless times already, but he can never get enough of it. Mark loves linking them slowly, jumping from mole to mole as his pad drags over the warm skin of Donghyuck's throat (he's always so warm), pressing down a little bit harder on that one mole near the edge of his jaw, where his pulse jumps under Mark's finger. He loves to feel every single goosebump along the way, enjoys his trip around the sharpness of Donghyuck's jawline, the stubble scratching Mark's skin lightly as he lands on Donghyuck's forever-soft cheek.

Donghyuck's skin is so pretty, caramel-tan against Mark's paper-pale, splashed with a pink blush in all the best places. The small moles make it all better, pulling Mark forward to press his lips to them.

He's seen what fans are always saying about Donghyuck's moles, how they keep calling them stars and like to link them together to draw constellations over pictures. Mark thinks it fits perfectly, moles like little stars decorating a boy meant to shine.

"You know what?" Donghyuck breaks the peaceful silence, always coming through unexpectedly like thunder. Mark doesn't reply, he only watches carefully as Donghyuck turns his face on the pillow to look at him in the eyes, puckering his lips to press a soft peck to the rough pad of Mark's index finger. "You've got stars all over you."

"Wait, what?" Mark asks, his voice going all high-pitched and loud in surprise. He retreats his hand instantly, pushing himself up on an elbow to stare down at Donghyuck with wide eyes.

Donghyuck stares back at him unblinking, his lips slowly twitching up into a threatening smile. "I can see right through you, Mark Lee," he whispers. And Mark wants to reply, he wants to whisper back _I know, I know_ , but his words die even before they can crawl up his throat.

His eyes slide down, still not strong enough to hold Donghyuck's gaze for too long (he lasts more than three seconds now, that has to count for something). He knows he's blushing, his face feels feverish-hot even in the coldness of the room, but Donghyuck doesn't have mercy on him, he's suddenly crawling all over Mark without giving him any room to escape.

Donghyuck throws one of his legs over Mark's thighs, straddling him easily as he curls his fingers around Mark's pointy wrists, pressing them to the pillow at each side of Mark's head. He looms over Mark threateningly, smiling with a wicked twist on his mouth, his tongue peeking between his white teeth (he's been smiling like this since Mark first ever saw him, his teeth aren't crooked anymore, but the pride hidden between them has never changed).

It's like direct danger taking over Mark, a menace ready to sneak under his skin. And there is nowhere else Mark would rather be, wouldn't run away even if he was given the chance.

Donghyuck doesn't kiss him, though. He doesn't keep Mark's wrists pinned to the mattress, either. He slides down Mark's body, his fingers gliding feather-light over the sensitive skin of Mark's arms as he sinks lower, lower, lower. He only stops once his chin is resting on Mark's lower abdomen, his nose catching on the dip of Mark's belly button for a second before he's looking up at Mark one more time.

"Have you realized?" Donghyuck asks in a murmur. His sharp smile is completely gone now, his face clear and open as he slides his thumbs down Mark's ribs gently, causing him to curl his back into the touch. "They are everywhere," Donghyuck whispers again, the thumb of his left hand digging into the hollow of Donghyuck's hip, pressing against a small brown dot there.

Barely anything has happened, and Mark is already breathless, his mouth open as he tries to take in ragged gulps of air. His chest is buzzy in anticipation as he stares down at Donghyuck, and he has to grab at the pillow tightly to stop himself from biting down on his own fingers.

"I think this one's my favorite," Donghyuck keeps mumbling, his lips dragging over Mark's skin like a caress before he's plating a firm kiss to a tiny mole right next to his belly button. "I always wanna spread my hands all over here," he talks, still facing Mark's body, his teeth brushing the skin lightly as he moves up a little bit, settling on another mole at the end of Mark's ribs, where they jut out almost prettily.

Mark can't hold himself back any longer when Donghyuck slips his tongue between his teeth, tracing the bumps of Mark's ribs with the wet tip before he's stopping at another mole, right under his left nipple. Mark's hand lets go of the pillow to card through Donghyuck's hair instead, his nails scratching lightly at his nape the way he knows he likes it, and Donghyuck grunts against him, the deep sound rattling through Mark's ribs and making him moan in return, his back lifting off the bed again.

"Oh my god, Hyuck," he croaks out, his voice embarrassingly rough when he's barely been touched.

Mark twists his fingers into Donghyuck's hair and pulls, ripping his mouth away from his skin to look at him properly. Donghyuck's eyes are blown hide, lips spit-bright, cheeks almost cherry-pink, but he stares up at Mark blinking innocently. Mark swallows hard, trailing his nails down Donghyuck's neck and scratching at the skin experimentally, dragging another groan out of him that skyrockets Mark's heartbeat, pounding frantically into his temples, behind his eyes, on his wrists (everywhere, everywhere).

"You've got such a pretty body, Mark," Donghyuck mumbles, glancing down again to nose at Mark's skin, his fingers coming to rest on the dips between Mark's ribs. "You're pretty all over," he mumbles into Marks's chest, right over where his heart keeps swelling up and swelling up to the point Mark thinks he's about to lose his mind, his breath constantly caught in his throat.

Mark can't help the high-pitched whine that rips through him, so loud that it almost makes his throat hurt. His hand slides down from Donghyuck's body and falls into the mattress as he squirms a little in the bed, feeling as if he's melting inside, going boneless and tense at the same time as Donghyuck keeps traveling up his body.

"Look so good everywhere," Donghyuck keeps saying, his lips and hands touching Mark so lightly, as if he deserves to be handled with care. "You blush so easily, too. Beautiful," he mumbles once he reaches Mark's collarbones, dipping his tongue in the hollow at the base of Mark's neck, licking at the skin as if he can't get enough of Mark's taste.

And Mark is moaning almost embarrassingly now, a limp arm thrown over his heated face as he squirms at every soft touch. He feels like he's about to explode, every single compliment sinking through his skin and setting somewhere deep, filling him up with a giddiness he's never felt before. He's high on the feeling, his head going cloudy as his eyes prickle with tears. He feels so pretty all of a sudden, Donghyuck's praises falling over him as if he deserves them, as if they make sense.

"You even sound pretty," Donghyuck giggles when he noses at the side of Mark's neck. His entire body is spread all over Mark's now, his nose tucked into his neck as he nibbles the mole at the base. "My pretty boy."

Mark brings his arms around Donghyuck, his fingers twisting into his shirt, fisting the fabric at the back. He feels so incredibly sensitive as Donghyuck sinks his teeth right where his neck meets his shoulder, Donghyuck's shirt feels sandpaper against Mark's flushed chest, but he can't help but pull him closer against him, Mark's own back arching one more time, trying to crush the minimal space between them.

"God, Mark," Donghyuck groans against him, tracing the side of Mark's neck with his tongue until his lips stop on the mole there. "I want you so bad," he speaks against it, sounding even more broken than Mark, his voice cracking everywhere. "Never felt like this before," he adds in the softest whisper Mark's ever heard coming from him, and then he's sucking into Mark's neck hard, his left hand flying to the other side of Mark's neck and pressing there eagerly.

It's as if Donghyuck is shifting right into Mark's body, going from soft to sharp in the blink of an eye, twisting himself again and again, as if he wants to show all of himself to Mark but he doesn't even know where he's supposed to start. And Mark wants it all, he wants to take everything, wants to crack himself open and let Donghyuck crawl right inside of him, tuck himself into his ribs.

So Mark tilts his head to the side, allowing Donghyuck to bite and suck and nibble at his skin even if he's gonna have to be hiding the mark there for days, and he sneaks his hands under Donghyuck's shirt. He digs his nails into Donghyuck's lower back, scratches right above the elastic of his sleeping sweats, and Donghyuck shudders against him almost violently, crying into the spit-stained skin of Mark's neck.

"You're so good to me," Donghyuck says as he pulls back a bit, his thighs bracketing either side of Mark's hips perfectly as if they are meant to be slotted together. He's speaking softly again, but he looks like the best kind of nightmare staring down at Mark like this, red-faced, half-lidded, with his lips swollen and glistening, mouth half-open as his chest heaves as fast as Mark's own. "You like it when I remind you, right?" he's looking right into Mark's eyes, and Mark is half-sure there are tears in the corners of his eyes, but he's so exposed that there is no room to care anymore. "So good to me, Mark," Donghyuck repeats, softly this time, leaning down to press a close-lipped peck to the mole of Mark's cheek.

Donghyuck looks and sounds so gentle and dangerous at the same time, just like the walking contradiction Mark met so many years ago, but completely different at the same time. Mark sighs again when Donghyuck brings one of his hands to his face, thumbing over Mark's cheek before he leans in again to press one last kiss to the mole on Mark's left eyelid.

"You okay?" Donghyuck whispers once he draws back again, both of his hands coming to rest at Mark's shoulders now, straightening himself up a bit on his lap.

"I'm. Woah," Mark mumbles, cutting himself in a giggle that sounds almost hysterical when he hears how deep his own voice sounds. "I'm feeling perfect, Hyuck. You- You're perfect," he says with all the honesty he can muster, his fingers squeezing the warm curve of Donghyuck's hips, still underneath his shirt.

Donghyuck almost crumples on top of him just due to two simple words. He makes a broken sound in the back of his throat, saying Mark's name again under his breath. He shifts on top of Mark then, his hands flat on the flushed skin of Mark's chest as he rocks into his lap.

An unexpectedly loud moan comes out of Mark's mouth, his fingers tightening around Donghyuck's hips so hard that he's afraid he's gonna leave prints behind. He's only now aware of how hard they both are, so sensitive that he has to grit his teeth together to stop himself from shuddering at the friction.

Donghyuck's head rolls forward, and his dark hair falls gently over his eyes when he grinds against Mark one more time, harder and more decisive, his hands pressing white fingerprints on Mark's pink-flushed chest.

"Mark, I-" he says in a broken whine, leaning closer again to bump their noses together. "Mark. Fuck me."

And Mark has to chew on his already swollen lower lip again to stop himself from whimpering desperately at the words, his fingers trailing up Donghyuck's spine until he can press against his nape, pulling him down to finally, _finally_ kiss his lips.

The fog in Mark's mind is getting stronger as he licks into Donghyuck's mouth, his hips pushing off the bed to grind up against him again, chasing after the friction. He's a bit lightheaded at the request, nibbling at Donghyuck's mouth desperately because he doesn't really know how to deal with everything that's rushing through his body, overwhelming in the best way possible.

It's not as if they've never done stuff together before. All the pent up tension they had to deal with for months ended up overflowing and turning into hands slipping under waistbands, mouths kissing places they've never thought they could ever reach, exploring each other's dips and turns eagerly, slowly finding out the best spots to kiss, suck and scratch. But they've never reached this point yet, and Mark's head spins a little at the thought of Donghyuck wanting to gift him another one of his firsts, after everything he's already given him.

"Are you-" Mark tries to speak against Donghyuck's mouth, but he's chasing after his lips like an enchanted man as soon as Donghyuck tries to pull back to look at him. "Sorry. Oh my god. Are you, like, sure? You know I’ve never..." he trails off, slipping his hand from underneath Donghyuck's shirt to run them through his hair instead.

"Do you remember," Donghyuck starts, his words low and raspy between his ragged breaths. "When I told you that I knew you were the best for me?" he blurts out, his eyes incredibly soft around the corners and blown wide with lust at the same time. "I meant it. I meant it in every way, Mark," he leans closer to push his next words into Mark's mouth, all sweet and so, so warm. "And I'll keep reminding you until you believe me."

And Mark has always liked sweet things, he's always been a sucker for pretty words and cute boys, he's always melted like sugar in water at the sight of a beautiful smile. Donghyuck just happens to be everything Mark likes and more, and he's always been a weak man. So he pushes his back off of the mattress again and traps Donghyuck under his body, already melting into him when Donghyuck _beams_ at him, all pretty skin and pretty cheeks and pretty teeth.

Mark feels most like himself like this: lost in the storm that is Donghyuck, blown away by the force of him, split open in the best kind of way.

\---

It's one of those long, long nights that only belong to the end of the year, when the darkness stretches out for so many hours that Mark doesn't even get to see the sunlight at all because he spends the brightest hours of the day locked up in the studio and practice rooms.

But he likes these long nights, with the tiles of the kitchen floor in NCT Dream's dorm uncomfortably hard and piercing cold against the bones of his ankles as the seven of them sit cross-legged in a circle.

They could move to the living room, where the warm carpet floor seems like the best option to gather together in the middle of a chill night, the handle of the clock ticking past-midnight. This is their spot, though. It's been their spot since Mark found Jisung crying out of homesickness on the kitchen tiles so many years ago—when he was soft everywhere and shorter than Mark, shorter than all of them. The six of them curled around him so naturally, disregarding the hardness and coldness of the floor just to make Jisung feel warmer.

Jisung is still soft everywhere. 5 years later, he's all long limbs and a lanky body and thin, thin wrists. Jisung is all tall legs and slim bones and pointy joints. But his cheeks remain round and chubby, his features gently drawn in a forever-baby face, his lips parting in a heart-shaped smile when he's happy, eyes squinted cutely when he's having a good time. He's so much taller than Mark now, but he looks just like the little kid Mark learned to take care of when he didn't even know how to look after himself, and he's always going to stay that way.

"I like my eyes," Jisung says now, opening his eyes exaggeratedly as he leans forward towards Chenle. "I know you say they are small, but I like them," he sticks his tongue out when Chenle huffs at him, his mouth stretching into that heart-shaped smile of his.

"They are small, but they are charming," Jaemin coos, stretching his body over Donghyuck and Jeno to reach Jisung and ruffle his hair fondly. Jisung ducks his head away, but the smile stays right in place.

"Well, I like everything about myself," Donghyuck says, pushing Jaemin away with a rough shove. "I think I'm perfect," and Mark knows he's exaggerating, but he also knows that Donghyuck means it, and he likes him a bit more for it.

"What you are is so full of shit," Renjun deadpans in a flat tone, whining high right a second later when Donghyuck punches him jokingly.

"What about you, Mark?" Chenle bumps his shoulder against Mark's, wrapping an arm around his shoulders right after. "What do you like most about yourself?"

"Um," Mark presses his lips together, his eyes shifting to the floor to think about something. At 14, he would've probably shrugged and ducked his head, he would've flushed red and mumbled _I don't really know_. Now, he licks his lips and says, "I think I like my work ethic, you know? I mean, I always work hard and try my best. And, like, no matter the results, I'm kinda proud of that, seriously."

Chenle hums approvingly, squeezing Mark's shoulders lightly as he leans his head against Mark's. Mark can't help the small smile that settles on his lips, allowing himself to relax against Chenle, his eyes sliding towards Donghyuck sitting in front of him almost unconsciously.

Donghyuck is smiling too, so tiny that is barely there, looking at Mark with an expression that looks awfully close to the way Taeyong always stares at them.

It's gone in the blink of an eye, though. Donghyuck's expression morphs right before Mark's eyes, his mouth sharpening into a dangerous smirk as he says, "The results better be fucking spectacular now that you’re coming back to us, _leader_ ," his eyebrows crooking teasingly.

The news came earlier today, when Mark was still trapped in the studio trying to figure out how to put his thoughts into music all on his own. Renjun busted through the door with his chest heaving, cheeks pink and stretched into a wide, wide smile.

"You haven't checked your phone, right?" he told Mark, walking closer to wrap his sweaty fingers around Mark's hand, the one holding his pen.

"Dude, what's going?" Mark looked up at him suspiciously, smiling and frowning at the same time. He didn't resist when Renjun took his hand and squeezed. "Did you run here or something? Oh my god."

"Mark," Renjun tugged at his fingers almost painfully, his smile becoming impossibly big. "You're coming back, man. Why do you even have a phone if you never fucking check it? You're coming back next year."

Mark only blinked up at him, the seams of his mouth tugging up into a smile even though he had no clue what Renjun was talking about, but grinning back at Renjun has always been a natural reflex. "Coming back where?"

"Dream, hyung," Renjun said, breathless laughter breaking Mark's name at the end. "They're letting you come back, man."

That's how they ended up gathering for one of their long nights, Renjun tugging at Mark's arm all the way from the studio to NCT Dream's dorms, leaving behind uncompleted lyrics and overdue work. But Mark has always been more than willing to steal hours to his days to share them with Dream.

\---

After his fourth debut, Mark learns that this life never gets easier, fame never gets any kinder, and losing yourself to your stage persona can be easier than you think. But he also learns to rely on others, he learns to share the burden just enough to be able to keep moving forward, he learns to crack himself open just enough to remember who he is, where he stands, who knows him best. Mark learns that comparing himself to others will never be the right way to improve (even if he still slips once in a while), he learns that _perfect_ is not the only way to do everything, and that you can't catch up with someone else who's been running for far longer than you in half the time they've had.

After his fourth debut, Mark learns that there is nothing shameful in thinking of his body as a comfortable place, learns to appreciate his own skin when it's flushed red, bruised purple, bitten raw, and learns that he can feel just as pretty when he's white-pale, smooth, and untouched.

After his fourth debut, Mark learns that sometimes endings can shift into a new beginning, he learns that you can never regain the moments you've missed, but that nothing stops you from pushing forward to create new ones. He learns that, sometimes, you can dream wide awake, and endlessly.

After his fourth debut, Mark learns that there's a boy by his side who's willing to learn every version of Mark, in every way possible. He learns that there's a boy by his side who's not ashamed to ask Mark to teach him. He learns that there's a boy by his side more than ready to shed off his skin and allow Mark to crawl right inside. And Mark learns to accept that he wants to keep this (whatever it is) forever, and that the verb _to like_ falls short, short, shorter every time he tries to name what he feels for this boy.

After his fourth debut, Mark finally gets to learn Donghyuck inside out, and he allows himself to be learned.

\---

Even if Mark’s been getting better with new people through the years, he’s never been that good with kids. There’s something incredibly scary about their fast wit and unfiltered sincerity, their ability to trap you into a conversation you don't understand mixed up with the inability to explain their thoughts properly, leaving you confused and looking like a fool.

Donghyuck, though, has always been good with kids. Mark's known this fact since forever, having experience with his siblings, Donghyuck has known the right way to deal with kids since he himself was still a kid. He's also witty in a way Mark can barely keep up with, adjusting his fast jokes to whoever he's talking to easily (just one more thing of the long list of stuff Mark admires about him).

Knowing Donghyuck is good with kids is one thing, seeing him with his siblings is another thing, but something Mark is used to. Seeing Donghyuck interacting with kids he's just met is something completely different, and almost breath-taking.

"There is no age to become an idol, but I'd recommend you to finish your studies before you decide to start this career," he's saying now, leaning on his hands as he keeps up a relaxed conversation with the little girl sitting in front of him, his hair shining purple under the bright white light of the set. "There are many things you can't do once you choose this path, so I recommend you to live life as a normal student before you start."

Donghyuck is speaking slowly and clearly, but he isn't altering his voice to sound softer or younger, he isn't fishing for easy words or simple sentences. He speaks to kids as equals, confident in what he's saying and confident in what the other end is understanding.

It's a sharp contrast to the way Mark handles kids, he gets tongue-twisted, his voice going unconsciously mellow and quiet. Mark talks to the little girl carefully, fearing he'll make the wrong move and scare her away. Still, the girl beams at him and giggles at everything he says, taking a liking to him so instantly and unabashedly that Mark's cheeks go warm.

The thought that Donghyuck and him complement each other is as abrupt as it is old. It's nothing new, Mark has known that they just _fit_ since he was 14, so different from each other that they are able to cover the other's weakest points seamlessly.

Suddenly, Mark finds himself wishing for a shared life out in the open. He finds himself hoping for a future where they can share a bed every night without making up excuses, wishing for days where they can walk under the sunlight with their fingers interlocked. Mark finds himself thinking that he can see the two of them raising kids together, and it scares the living shit out of him.

They've never talked about it, not really, but picturing Donghyuck as part of his future is so easy to Mark, even if he is scared of wanting too much, too much, _too much_. Mark keeps getting greedier as time goes by, but he's never been selfish, and he wants to swallow his fear to tangle Donghyuck into his life forever, and share every part of it with him.

\---

No matter how many times Mark looks at himself in the mirror, or from how many different angles he checks himself out, he still looks really weird with his new glasses. They are just as round as his old ones, but in black now, and so thick-rimmed that they make him look a bit funny.

Not many people have realized he's changed them yet, and the few that have pointed out what he already knows, that he looks _weird_. Still, Mark doesn't regret choosing them. He still has to get used to the new image, but the glasses make him look younger, his face seems rounder, and he feels pretty _cute_.

When Dream see him for the first time and their first reaction is to mock the glasses, he's expecting it. Teasing and joking around have always been their love language, after all, and Mark's become fluent in it a long time ago.

But then Chenle looks at him with a straight face and says, "I do like your glasses, Mark. You look cute."

And Mark's answer comes to him right away and, for the first time in years, he doesn't fight. "Thank you," he says automatically, smiling with hot cheeks.

Later that day, Donghyuck steals Mark's glasses.

He looks beautiful with them on. Donghyuck always looks beautiful, but there's something about him wearing Mark's items that really makes Mark's blood sing (even if he started stealing Mark's clothes the second week after they met). The glasses make his round face look even rounder, and he keeps looking at himself on the screen of his phone, tilting his head to the side, puckering his lips, running his fingers through his long hair (it's getting so long, Mark's hands itch with the need to tug at it).

"You look cute," Mark tells him leaning across the table they are sitting at to get a better view at Donghyuck's cheeks, at the soft blush that spreads beneath the thick rim of the glasses at Mark's words.

"I know," Donghyuck says, frowning a little. He takes the glasses off then, leaning in as well to push them up the bridge of Mark's nose. "They look cuter on you, though."

And Mark _could_ fight back this time around, because Donghyuck's soft, round face will always, _always,_ be cuter than Mark's sharp lines and high cheekbones. He doesn't, though. He only ducks his head to try to hide the giddy smile on his lips, even if it's useless because Donghyuck can look right through him.

The thing is, Mark knows what it's like to fuck Donghyuck, to pin him against a mattress and make him squirm in pleasure. He knows what's like to be fucked by him, too, to arch his chest against the warmth of Donghyuck's body and surrender under the force of him. But it's stuff like this that always gets to him the most, the easy compliments that slip out of Donghyuck's mouth as if they are natural because that's exactly how he sees Mark.

Mark desperately wishes he could see himself through Donghyuck's eyes. But, for now, learning to accept his compliments is good enough.

\---

Mark can't see himself through Donghyuck's eyes, but it doesn't really matter because he feels so, so pretty pressed up against him, with Donghyuck's lips on his jaw, peppering hard kisses to the sharp edge there.

He's only mildly aware that they shouldn't be doing this here. They are tangled up together against one of the tiled walls of the gym locker room, their clothes still clinging to their bodies with sweat as they grab onto each other with clammy hands. Anyone could walk in on them at any moment, even if they are hidden in one of the shower stalls, the water running to muffle their noises even though none of them is under the spray.

Right now, Mark is too caught up in Donghyuck's body to care. He's got him cornered against the tiles, his hands sneaking eager under Donghyuck's shirt, fingers brushing his warm, soft tummy before they start to crawl their way up. Donghyuck is so smooth beneath Mark's thumbs, golden skin that _feels_ just as pretty as it always looks.

"Hyuck, you're so-" Mark tries to say, but the words die out in his throat when Donghyuck starts to nibble at the hollow of his collarbones, his tongue sticking out to lick the sweaty skin there. "Shit, Donghyuck. You feel so fucking good."

Donghyuck hums into his neck in appreciation, arching his torso into Mark's palms as he keeps going up Donghyuck's body, riling up the damp shirt in the process.

 _This_ might be the single thing that feels better to Mark than other people praising him. After all, Mark’s been born to gift away compliments like candy, sugary sweet and selfless, and Donghyuck deserves every single one of them. It’s been seven years and he still goes a little breathless at the way Donghyuck reacts to his words, even when he doesn't _need_ to hear them. Donghyuck has always known his worth and his beauty, but he goes boneless against Mark every time Mark whispers praises into his skin.

"You've been working out so well. Bulking up prettily, aren't you?" Mark says now, nosing at Donghyuck's sweaty temple at the same time his hands squeeze the toned muscle of his chest, nails dragging over the smooth skin to grab at his shoulders. Donghyuck _mewls_ into the crook of Mark's neck open-mouthed, and a violent shudder has him gripping the fabric of Mark's shirt for stability. "Wanna mark you up all over. You're so pretty, I want my mouth everywhere."

"Shit, Mark," Donghyuck grunts. He's pulling away then, a broken gasp leaving his parted lips when he throws his head against the tiles. "You need to shut up if you don't want me to lose it in public."

And Mark _knows_ Donghyuck is right, but he's looking at Mark with half-lidded eyes, open-mouthed, red-cheeked. He looks so out of it already, all sweaty and disheveled and out of breath, all shaking fingers and flushed skin and knees so, so weak that he keeps digging his pads into Mark's back to stop himself from falling down.

"Beautiful," the adjective rolls off Mark's tongue so easily, because that's the first thought that always comes to his mind whenever his eyes find the boy in front of him. He takes his hands out from underneath Donghyuck's shirt to bring one down to his thigh, fingers slipping under the sports shorts to dig into the warm, soft muscle, tugging Donghyuck’s leg up to help him wrap it around Mark’s waist. His other hand crawls up to Donghyuck’s neck, so he can press against the feverish skin there, feel Donghyuck's heart skipping a beat when he repeats, "You're so beautiful. I'm so lucky."

And Donghyuck always gets this look on his face when Mark praises him (and he's been praising him almost every day for so, so many years): plump lips pressed together in a smile so tiny that seems accidental, cheeks so pink that he might as well be melting on the inside, eyes so soft that it seems like he's looking at a mirage, as if Mark is too good to be true. He's a sight to admire, and Mark wants to do exactly that for as long as Donghyuck will have him.

That small smile on Donghyuck’s face stays there for half a beat, someone other than Mark might’ve missed it. Mark blinks once, and suddenly Donghyuck is smirking at him as threatening as ever, his fingers clutching Mark’s shoulders to push him back until they are both standing under the spray of the shower. Mark spends so long chasing droplets of water down Donghyuck’s neck with his tongue, that he loses the notion of time.

Sadly, Donghyuck can't see himself through Mark's eyes, but Mark can try to make him feel just as special as Donghyuck makes him feel.

\---

There are many things Mark has learned during his time as an idol, many things he has stopped feeling ashamed of. Acting cute is not one of them.

He's been told he's naturally cute all his life and, even though he still struggles to see it most of the time, he's learned to duck his head and say _thank you_. But being cute and acting cute are two very different things.

Mark has accepted the fact that he will never feel fully like himself in front of a camera, no matter how much time goes by, and getting asked to do something you aren't confident of in a room full of them is so terrifying that's almost paralyzing. He still presses his hands flat against the surface of the table and pushes himself to his feet, because Mark has never felt that brave, but he's never been a coward, either.

It's even harder now, with a room full of people he trusts and people he barely knows, old faces and new faces all mixed up together, but both waiting for Mark to impress them somehow.

Mark's been dealing just fine with NCT 2020, he had to get better at socializing as a matter of survival if he wanted to make it in this industry, in this _team_. Still, he's a bit desperate to come off as something more than lame to the younger members he still isn't close with.

As he stands in front of the table, a camera zooming in on him threateningly, he feels just almost as small as when he first stepped into a practice room to bump into Jaemin. Now, he lifts his chin and smiles with pretty teeth, moving around in an awkward dance that makes him feel anything but _cute_. Mark forces his smile remains in place, though, and the people behind the cameras are smiling just as wide and far more genuine.

The room stays in deafening silence for a beat that stretches for far too long until Donghyuck's high-pitched laughter comes cutting through the air like lightning, and everyone else follows him right after (because who could ever resist a storm).

Mark looks at Donghyuck as he makes his way back to his seat, his smile getting bigger at the sight of him. He's got his head thrown back, eyes screwed shut and mouth wide open, his chest and shoulders shaking as laughter keeps rolling through him.

Learning is a constant process, and Mark likes to keep his mistakes under his skin so they won't have the power to scratch him ever again, but he still stumbles over the same wound twice sometimes. He's gotten a lot better at accepting Donghyuck's affection, but a small part of him spends the rest of the broadcast wondering if Donghyuck is laughing out of pity or if he finds Mark genuinely funny.

Once the cameras stop rolling, though, Donghyuck gets as close as he can when other people aew watching. He presses his chest to Mark's shoulder, curls a hand around Mark's ear to tug hard, and says, "Ah, you're so embarrassing."

Mark has to twist his fingers together hard to stop himself from tugging Donghyuck closer, from touching somewhere he shouldn't. He opens his mouth to reply _I know_ out of habit, but Donghyuck cuts him off before the words exist.

"You're always so cute," Donghyuck says, fingers dragging over the side of Mark's neck for a second once he lets go of his burning ear. And he adds, "hyung," in a sickeningly sweet voice because _he knows_.

\---

Mark has never been a jealous person. He's fairly sure that he wouldn't have been able to handle a relationship with Donghyuck if he was a jealous person. He had to learn to share Donghyuck with the entire world when he was still a kid, that's what you sign up for when you choose this path in life, constant attention sticking to you like a second, unpleasant skin.

This, though, doesn't mean it's easy. It doesn't mean Mark isn't haunted by past insecurities in some fast, fleeting moments.

There are so many more people around them now, 21 other guys fluttering around familiar practice rooms that feel too small all of a sudden, even if Mark's been living between their walls since he was 14. And Donghyuck keeps splitting himself open so, so easily, sharing himself with everyone at once, giving Mark less and less of his attention when everybody's eyes are on him, irremediably and overwhelming.

It's not only a Donghyuck thing, though. Mark had to turn himself into an outgoing person as a matter of survival, and he feels pulled at the seams sometimes, trying to keep up with everything the world demands of him, everything his group demands of him.

Mark is not a jealous person, but he gets a little worn out sometimes. And insecurities are a smart, tricky thing, they take over you when you're at your weakest point. Mark is not a jealous person, but he's always seeking attention, even if he's been raised to believe he should never ask for it, he should _gain it_.

Luckily, Donghyuck can see right through him.

He comes to stand between Mark's legs once they get back to the dorms from practice, almost midnight and the dorm still bursting with life. Mark looks down at Donghyuck from where he's sitting on the kitchen counter, his body pushed backward as he rests his weight on his hands, nails clawing at the cold, smooth surface when Donghyuck presses against his thighs with warm, warm palms.

"Hyung," Donghyuck says, his face uncharacteristically serious, but sounding incredibly sweet.

" _Hyung?_ " Mark raises a skeptical eyebrow at him. "What do you want?"

But Donghyuck shakes his head no, drawing his lower lip between his teeth as he looks around the kitchen to make sure they are alone. "Hyung," he repeats, even softer now, leaning in just a tad as his fingertips dig into the hard muscle of Mark's thighs. "You're my favorite, hyung."

Mark's shoulders slump at the words, his mouth parting after being caught by surprise. "Hyuck," he mumbles, pushing himself forward to brush Donghyuck's dirty-blonde hair away from his eyes, still damp after his shower. "You don't have to do this. I'm good. I don't need you to, like, reassure me all the time or-"

"I want to," Donghyuck whispers softly. He moves closer then, his fingers walking a light path from Mark's knees to his waist, hands crumpling Mark's shirt as he balls his fists there before he's pushing his face into Mark's neck. "You're my favorite," he repeats, lips dragging over Mark's skin in a gentle caress (and goosebumps appear all over Mark's arms because there are some things you simply can never get used to).

Mark wraps his arms around Donghyuck's back then, his palm pressed between his shoulder blades to bring him close enough to hook his chin on Donghyuck's shoulder. He breathes in the soap-sweet scent of Donghyuck's hair, basks in the ever-warm feeling of his body, and allows himself to melt against Donghyuck when he admits, "You're my favorite, too."

A small giggle comes out of Donghyuck's throat, causing him to shake right between Mark's arms. "Yeah, I know," he says, nosing at the sensitive skin of Mark's ear, sending a shudder down his spine, as electric as lightning. "But you should know, too, Mark."

There are hands squeezing Mark's hips lightly before Donghyuck is pulling away just enough to look him in the eyes. Mark has to grit his teeth together to stop himself from apologizing even though he isn't sure what he should be apologizing for. His insecurities maybe, his endless carvings for attention, his constant need to feel needed, his lack of confidence to be brave enough to ask for the things he wants. He swallows his apology with a hard gulp when Donghyuck looks at him with warm, round eyes, that tiny smile on his lips that he always reserves for Mark and nobody else.

It's okay, Mark reminds himself, to lose your footing once in a while as long as you learn how to get up. After all, learning is a constant process, and Mark's kind of proud of everything he's learned so far. And he's got Donghyuck on his side, more than willing to lend him a hand and put him to his feet if Mark is not able to stand up on his own.

"You're a big baby, you know that?" Donghyuck tells him, that soft smile turning into his trademark smirk as he brings his hands up to card them through Mark's dark brown hair. "I've known you're the best for me since I was 13," he confesses then, because he's never, ever had any concerns when it comes to stripping himself vulnerable for Mark. The only thing that's changed is that, lately, he doesn't need to hide his honesty between jabs and jokes.

"Oh? Was it love at first sight?" Mark teases, trying to ignore the way his heart is about to crack his ribs open with the frantic rhythm in his chest.

"Shut up, asshole," Donghyuck frowns at him, disentangling one of his hands from Mark's to tug hard at his red ear. "Who said anything about love?"

Even if Mark has to admit he gets a little jealous sometimes, he can proudly admit that he knows Donghyuck better than anyone else, and no one will ever be able to take that away from him. He can read right through Donghyuck just as easily as Donghyuck can read through him. And he can see him waiting expectantly now, soft pink high on his cheeks and glassy eyes.

"Cuddle session on the kitchen counter, seriously?" Johnny says when he walks into the kitchen to find them all tangled up there. He doesn't pay them any mind, though, his attention focused on the fridge to try to find something fast for dinner.

Mark doesn't dare to kiss Donghyuck senseless right here, right now, no matter how badly his body is yearning for it. But he pulls him into another hug, arms tight around his shoulders and legs wrapped around his waist. When he's got Donghyuck tucked under his chin, warm and solid and _there_ , he whispers, "I love you too, baby."

It feels weird rolling off his tongue like this, the feeling bare and out in the open even if it's something quiet pressed right into Donghyuck's ear, like a secret only the two of them can hear. But they are the truest words Mark has ever said out loud, and they make Donghyuck go boneless against him, nuzzling into the crook of Mark's neck as if he's trying to dig his home there.

\---

"A Canadian that doesn't know how to skate?" Donghyuck laughs loudly and open-mouthed as he moves in circles around Mark, a little clumsy on his skates but still far better than Mark himself. "Seriously, Mark?"

Mark can't help feeling a bit ridiculous standing there, the blades of his skates firmly pressed against the slippery ice so he won't tumble to the floor at the smallest movement. "Shut up, Donghyuck. As if you're that good at it."

"At least I can move without falling on my nose!" Donghyuck screams as he slides away, his high-pitched giggle trailing after him.

It still gets Mark a bit flustered—not being that good at something he's supposed to dominate—but he can blame the heat on his cheeks to the coldness of the place, and there is nothing shameful about needing a little bit of help sometimes. So he balls his hands into the fabric of his orange hockey pants and searches for the closest member around him.

"Hey, Jeno, can you help me out?" he shouts across the rink.

Jeno skates towards him ridiculously fast, with his eyes closed in half-moons and a bright teasing smile plastered on his face. "It's my first time skating, hyung. How can you be worse than me?"

He's skating confidently and proud, but he's still a beginner who doesn't know how anything works, so he ends up bumping into Mark's body with a choked huff, almost sending the two of them sprawling on the ice.

"So much bragging for _this_?" Mark laughs breathily, his hands grabbing tightly at Jeno's arms to keep himself on his feet.

"At least I can move!" Jeno bites back, pushing Mark away from him but still wearing that fond smile of his.

"You both suck," Donghyuck's voice comes from behind Mark before he's skating around him one more time. "Come here," he mumbles, stretching his gloved hands towards Mark for him to take.

So Mark does, he reaches out and easily curls his fingers into the soft material of Donghyuck's gloves, allowing himself to be pulled forward as his feet slide over the ice clumsily, tentatively.

It seems easy for a few seconds, with Donghyuck whispering a trail of concentrated little _yeah'_ s and _that's right'_ s, but something shifts all of a sudden, and Mark is tripping over his feet, sliding forward as his back arches backward. It's pretty scary for a second, he's already imagining the ache of his head slamming against the cold, hard ice, but Donghyuck tightens his grip on Mark's hands and tugs hard, one of his legs sliding in between Marks as he pulls him to stand straight one more time.

"Oh my god," Mark croaks out, his nails digging into Donghyuck's gloves as he pushes his chest forward until it presses against Donghyuck's shoulder. "Oh my god, I thought I was gonna die."

Donghyuck is already laughing, so loud and so much that Mark feels his body trembling even through their thick hockey outfits. He's got his eyes almost closed, tears already shining in the corners as he laughs open-mouthed, but his grip on Mark's hands remains just as strong, so he can't slip out.

"I hope the cameras caught that," Jeno says with words broken by laughter, skating closer one more time.

"Shut up, man," Mark huffs out. "I almost _died_!"

There is no heat to his tone, though, no hidden embarrassment nor genuine anger. There's only laughter bubbling in his chest, his own high-pitched giggle joining Donghyuck's all loud and clean and free. He feels shy, but there is no room for embarrassment inside of him at the moment. Sometimes, all you have to do to feel good is to laugh at yourself.

"I wouldn't let you die, asshole," Donghyuck breathes out once his laughter is almost gone. He tugs at Mark's hands one more time, but Mark digs his heels into the ice and stares at him with a crooked eyebrow. "C'mon, you know I got you," Donghyuck _pouts_ , so aware of the power he has over Mark that his pout turns upside down as soon as Mark starts to move with him.

At the end of the day, learning to skate in a few hours is not easy at all. Mark ends up falling on his butt more times he can count with the fingers of one hand and, once they are skating their way out of the rink, his entire body feels heavy and sore and so, so cold.

It doesn't matter that much, though, because Donghyuck still flops next to him on the benches of the changing room, beaming with red cheeks due to the cold and how much fun he had during the day.

"I think you aren't a lost cause after all," he says to Mark, bumping their shoulders together. "You did well," he adds, bringing his still gloved hand up to Mark's head to pull him close enough to press a fast kiss to the crown of his head.

And Mark is all sore and heavy and tired, but his cheeks hurt so good for smiling so much, it was all worth it.

\---

At 21 years old, Mark is all broad shoulders, toned muscle, and still pointy joints. He's a sharp jawline and big, big eyes, and moles all over his pale skin. He's a smaller collection of caps, black, round thick-rimmed glasses, and simple shirts that he has to keep replacing every other week because Donghyuck steals almost every single one of them.

At 21, Mark is brave for the things that matter, he's confident in his own skin, and he wears the pride he feels towards his hard work on his sleeve. He is incredibly loud laughter, and never-ending energy that slips out of him in an almost violent rush, and a heart so full of love that sometimes he thinks it might tear his chest apart.

He hasn't changed that much, he thinks as he stares at Donghyuck lying on the bed with him, the handles of the clock already past midnight, which means it's already January 1st (one more year to share together, and counting). Mark is still a sucker for sweet things, pretty words, and cute boys, and Donghyuck knows him just as much as he did back then, but he understands him even better now.

"Did you stop to think about all the stuff we did this year?" Donghyuck tells him, a little wine-soft after the New Year Eve's celebrations with the rest of their group.

Mark laughs through his nose lightly, the puff of air ruffling Donghyuck's red hair because that's how close they are. "We've been talking about it all day. Like, the other members wouldn't shut up about it, dude."

Donghyuck scrunches up his nose at the name, craning his neck back a little to glare at Mark through annoyed squinted eyes. It doesn't have the effect he wants, though, because Donghyuck is all round-cheeked, wine-flushed, cotton-soft against Mark's side, curled up into Mark's body as if there's nowhere else he'd rather be.

"You're cute," Mark tells him honestly because he can, because he's never been good at hiding the truth, because he's brave enough to do so. Donghyuck tries to pull further away, as much as his arm and leg over Mark's body allow him to go, and he wrinkles up his nose again in exaggerated disgust. "Even with that face you're still cute," Mark chuckles, tightening his grip around Donghyuck's waist to pull him close again.

"Stop getting off-topic, you're annoying me," Donghyuck punches his chest softly, just a deaf echo of the bite he has on normal days. When Mark grabs his hand to stop him, Donghyuck presses his thumb into the mole of Mark’s palm. "I'm trying to say that you worked hard this year. You did really well," he mumbles, his eyes blinking sleepily into Mark's, looking soft all over.

Mark chews into his bottom lip as he brings one of his hands up, fingers threading through the red strands of Donghyuck's hair. He's changed so much through the years, but he's managed to remain the same at the same time (he's always been a walking contradiction, after all). Donghyuck's hair color changes every other month, his teeth are lined up prettily, and he keeps getting bigger, broader, stronger. But he's the same boy who would jab at Mark's softest places just to smooth the wound with his pretty words. He's still breathtaking and beautiful like lighting, as dangerous as a storm, and always sunlight-bright and summer-warm, all at the same time.

Donghyuck is Mark's teacher in so many ways that Mark finds himself swallowing the _no, I didn't_ and the _you did better_ , to spit out a small, "I know," instead. And Donghyuck beams at him with pride written all over his face. "I danced better than you, too. Like, 90's love was totally my thing," Mark adds with a teasing smile.

"You wish, _dude_ ," Donghyuck bites back in a heartbeat, disentangling their hands to press his palm flat to Mark's chest to push himself up, staring down at him with a swollen chest to make himself look bigger. "I aced that choreo."

Mark purses his bottom lip into a pout, leaning his weight on his elbows to get a little bit closer to Donghyuck. "Will you call me 'hyung' if I agree?

Donghyuck's lips stretch into a tight line, eyebrows high on his forehead as he stares down at Mark pointedly, almost threateningly, but the hand on Mark's chest starts to draw random patterns over his skin when he replies, "You don't deserve it."

An unbelieving scoff falls from Mark's lips, but there's little to no heat behind it as it gets broken by a high-pitched giggle. "You did well, too," Mark finally admits, smiling fondly at Donghyuck when the praise falls over him, easing the frown between his eyebrows. "You're always the best," he adds, reaching out to thumb at the nape of Donghyuck's neck, tugging at the soft hair there the way Mark knows he likes it.

And Donghyuck goes so soft again right before his eyes, his body slumping into Mark's, hands coming up to cradle his jaw and bring him closer to whisper into his lips. "I know," Donghyuck says against Mark's mouth, firm and forever sure of himself and _familiar_. Mark knows he means it, and he loves him even more for it.

\---

Now, Mark knows that he’s never gonna be perfect, but he’s always been good enough for Donghyuck. And he's learned to feel good enough for himself, and that’s what matters most.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for taking the time to read this even though it's so long. i would really appreciate it if you could let me know your thoughts!! <3
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/tiniemarks) // [cc](https://curiouscat.me/tiniesung)


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